Biographical objects and collective memory in disasters: narratives of loss and symbolic consumption in the 2024 floods in Rio Grande do Sul

The article analyzes how objects emerge as devices of memory and symbolic consumption in the 2024 floods in Rio Grande do Sul. Based on reports from affected people and rescue initiatives, it is discussed how these material fragments go beyond the private sphere, activating processes of subjective reconstruction and collective belonging. Based on the studies of communication, memory and consumption, the text argues that objects, when they leave their private sphere, become operators of meaning in contexts of trauma. Its symbolic valorization reveals communicational practices of care, empathy and resistance, in which memory is re-inscribed as a form of continuity in the face of loss. In the end, it is concluded that these "traces of life" contribute to the elaboration of the experienced, sustaining the collective narrative of the tragedy and the symbolic reconstruction of everyday life.