Paper short abstract:

On March 14, 2018, Black councillor and activist Marielle Franco was brutally murdered. This paper is written from the perspective of black activism in Brazil, based on Marielle's history. The aim is to discuss the role of black people in the Brazilian context and the racial awareness movements.

Paper long abstract:

On March 14, 2018, Black councillor and feminist activist Marielle Franco was brutally murdered in Rio de Janeiro. Marielle became known for embracing the struggle for Black women and lesbians, besides exposing violence in poor communities and the lack of public security. Marielle was committed to this struggle by the time she was shot four times in her head. The crime against Marielle uncovers promiscuous relations among police, milícias and politicians, who are supposedly involved with the councillor's assassination. Furthermore, there was a remarkable wave of fake news spread on social media to demean Marielle's image by accusing her of being involved with organized crime and drug trafficking.

This paper is written from the perspective of black activism in Brazil, based on Marielle's history. The aim is to discuss the role of black people in the Brazilian contemporary context, underpinned by a historical reclaiming in order to understand the racial awareness movements.The paper will also analyze the main fake news used to downgrade the councillor's image. The issue which motivates the research involves Marielle's activism on black issues as an instrument to answer about the existence of a racial gap in Brazil, which could be masked by the democratic discourse. The paper will be based on authors who discuss racial issues in Brazil, from the classics (Skidmore, 1976, Fernandes, 1989; Freire, 1993) to contemporary (Ferreira, 2002; Lima, 2004; Santos, 2009). The content analysis methodology (Bardin, 2011) will be used to analyze fake news.