Introduction: Problems - Sorgen - Preocupações

Abstract

All this could and should have been a time of reflection, of the sound of the tip of a pen moving over paper, of reading books that had been on the list for a long time, of chatting, of playing, of walking. Instead, it turned into a time of frantic screens, of noisy hoorays on the accomplished task of making the university more virtual and more efficient to the costs of all those who deserved better, of the neoliberal and also, unsurprisingly, of unabashed hatred and racism. This time witnessed the production of rubbish and destruction, the creation of plastic copies of feudal monuments, of senseless waste and needless carelessness – and actually, the production of more distance. This bad taste is what gets embraced and dealt with in some detail in this issue of The Mouth. We have put together a collection of papers and other contributions in different formats, which engage with questions around language, and the ways in which we can or cannot use our language, in which the way we speak has become problematic, or is addressing difficult situations. Oftentimes, people seem to choose alternative, artful, indirect or subversive ways of expressing pain, sorrow or critique. This is also reflected in the current issue, where problems are addressed in multimodal, discursive and creative ways. Calling the practices of colonialism and plunder by their name, entering into a conversation on the limitations of sharing in an impoverished community just next to luxurious holiday paradises, speaking of the denial of experiences of violence, writing about ruination and structural racism, addressing the one thing that capitalism produces most, namely garbage: these are the topics of the present issue.