A Língua Portuguesa como Utopia: Agostinho da Silva e o Ideal da Comunidade Lusófona

Abstract

Since the l 980's decade, the creation of a Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP) became one of the main concerns of Portugal's foreign policy. Concurrently, vast sectors of the Portuguese society became involved in the debate about Lusophony. ln this process, in order to legitimate the CPLP that was then being created, the ideas of some intellectuals who developed various concepts of a "Portuguese-Speaking Community" throughout the twentieth century were recovered. Among those intellectuals stands Agostinho da Silva, one of the most original Portuguese thinkers of the last century. Usually remembered as one of the "founding fathers" of the Community, he developed in severa! of his works a rather original concept of what the Community should be and what role it could perform in the contemporary world order.