Rational and relational Montevideo carnival: popular stages and women with the stage on their shoulders

Abstract

This article intends to get to know and interpret the activity of women assuming leading roles in neighborhood committees that organize popular stages in
Montevideo’s carnival. Specifically, intends to understand the ways they assume these responsibilities, their motivations, how they develop that role and how they evaluate their accomplishments and challenges. From a qualitative point of view, it starts contextualizing the subject within Montevideo’s carnival,
which includes an industrial economy perspective and an analysis from the communication and culture political economy, to then focus on neighborhood
committees managing popular stages in Montevideo’s carnival and its network. In these committees women’s predominance stands out in relation to the voluntary work demanded for the operation of these stages. By interviewing these women we intend to access to the conditions for this management and showproduction, as much as the support they get, the possibilities of group decision processes and the incidence of contract mechanisms and program schedule possibilities.  This investigation aims to interpret culture constructions that are involved in this activity, crossing  Cultural Studies with Genre Studies.