Chamas da educação nacional e do sentimento pátrio: As escolas italianas no rio grande do sul da colonização ao final do século 19 (1875-1898)1

This article explores the origin and development of Italian schools subsidized by the royal Italian government in the Rio Grande do Sul during the second and third phase of Italian migrants' colonization of Southern Brazil. The author makes use of mostly inedited documentation to expand knowledge around the emergence of ethnicity-based elementary schools during the transition period from the end of the Brazilian Empire to the formation of Republican Federal States. By referring to reports sent to consular offices, this article allows analyzing the geography of statesponsored Italian schools in the Rio Grande do Sul as well as their features. It elaborates on the heterogeneity of their nature, organizational structures and teachers' conditions, and points out the difference between the schools sponsored by mutual support associations and the ones developed by private teachers. Moreover, the author investigates the viewpoints, the mentality and the changing strategies enacted by consular offices during the last decade of the 19th century in order to ensure the maintenance of an educational network for the alphabetization of the children of Italian migrants and perpetuation of national feelings. More particularly, the article sheds light on the different perspectives of the consuls in relation to the rural or urban context of schools.