“This brunette doesn't know the system I was raised in”

The hillbilly morals on the peripheries of Brazilian cities (1920-1970)

Abstract

This article examines the lyrics of hillbilly music in Brazil during fifty years of the 20th century, seeking to define the moral difference between rural and urban populations in the center-south of Brazil. Hillbilly music, although not a creation of the 20th century, educated the rural population that migrated to the city after the fall in coffee prices in 1930, settling in the 1960s-1980s during the rural exodus. With apocryphal religiosity and a peculiar view of life and morality, hillbilly music seeks to preserve the moral and political bias of the country people in the city. The romantic vision of opposition to capitalism is replaced by the utilitarian vision of country music.