Current Sociology

Abstract

The study of symbols has often focused on individuals who have achieved substantial and enduring iconic status among a large audience, such as Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela. However, the focus on successful cases overlooks the contentious process of becoming an icon. To address this gap, I reconstruct a case study of an incomplete iconization effort: the case of political violence against a capoeira master in Brazil during the 2018 presidential elections in a context of polarization, the rise of the far-right, and the election of Jair Bolsonaro. Through this case, I argue that in the contingency of becoming an icon, three processes dispute the meaning of the symbol: iconization, personalization, and counter-iconization. By examining a non-conventional case, I suggest the need to look at a “scale of iconicity” beyond mere success or failure. This case study allows us to reframe what iconicity could be by describing a mechanism of semi-icons that I call a “reservoir of iconicity.”