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Mele Pesti, a PhD at TU Institute of Germanic and Romance Languages and Cultures asks if cannibalism can be seen as an act of love. And which is more barbaric - cannibalism or war?

"Ritual cannibalism or anthropophagy is seen as a metaphor for cultural exchange: they were fugitives from a civilization we are eating, because we are strong and vindictive." These lines are written by the Brazilian modernist poet and thinker, Oswald de Andrade, in his "Manifesto Antropofago", 1928.

The metaphor of cultural anthropophagy described in the manifesto gives us an original perspective for understanding how external influences enter a culture. This shows culture in constant change - implementing elements from the outside and building new internal stability from that change. Cultural blending is becoming an increasingly significant process across the world and for that reason, the metaphor from Brazil should also be pondered in the Estonian context.

At the end of 2014, Mele Pesti defended her PhD based on the "Manifesto Antropofago" in Tallinn University. Her thesis reviews the millennia-old habit of contemplating the strange and frightening as "cannibals". This habit is what led Oswald de Andrade to creating the metaphor of anthropophagy. Reviewing the anthropological debate over the ritual of anthropophagy led to the following results:

1) our understanding of ritualistic cannibalism is strongly based on prejudice and very weak data;
2) the word "cannibal" has given a name and a face to the fear of the “Other”, which is based on a monstrous figure that dates back over two millennia;
3) the terms "anthropophagus" and "cannibal" have significant differences; to describe the ritual from a neutral viewpoint, the first should be used, as the latter is associated with a strong stereotype;
4) anthropophagy is not always aggressive.

Andrade probably chose the central metaphor of his manifest due to all of the aforementioned reasons. The main conclusion of the Thesis is that the metaphor of cultural anthropophagy demonstrates a strategy of constant renewal of the cultural identity employed by a certain group of people subjected to colonialization - the Brazilians. This strategy emphasizes the Brazilian's right to be the subjects of their own history, present and future, instead of living according to the models and meanings imposed on them.

On the other hand, anthropophagy shows worldwide and lasting influence of colonialist mind structures, prejudices and metaphors (such as cannibalism) to a country that has long since gained independence.