“Why Capoeira is so successful around the world is difficult to say. It is, instead, easy to say that the motivations are as many as the capoeristas are. Sometimes this fact disappoints me. I do not like when it is used to show up skills, braveness, arrogance, machismo (both in men and women), which are usually the motivations I spot coming from the the modern world.” (more…)
Should the acknowledgement of the large involvement of non-Brazilians capoeiristas today imply a detachment from the Brazilian culture and origins? The ‘internationalisation’ of Capoeira is a complex issue. In many of my talks and workshops, non-Brazilian capoeiristas share their concern about the underlying ethnic hierarchy in the Art. Many say things like: ‘The foreigners will always be treated as second-class capoeristas!” or “No matter how hard I try it’ll never be as if I was a Brazilian”. (more…)
Often after interviews and talks many of you guys came up with very nice thoughts and/or comments about the questions and/or different issues. I would appreciate if you could share them through this post. Though we won’t be able to use this in the documentary movie, I would still be able to use them in my research, or in future projects, after contacting you in this regard. (more…)
Picture sent by Mariola
Please, send me your best selection of pictures on 4capoeirathoughts_@_gmail_dot_com and I’ll add them to this post. I’ll also see if we can find someone to manage a Flicker account so that we can have all the pictures available.
Music is one of the main paths towards a better understanding of the cultural context from which Capoeira sprung from. It was a pleasure to see people sharing songs, their meanings, contexts and translations. Some were taking note of rhythm patterns and songs like real ethnographers. I’m sure some of you guys will play an important role in upholding the true values of Capoeira for the next generations.
The Jogo Aberto documentary movie aims to bridge practitioners from different backgrounds in their quest to learn Capoeira and master its potentialities as a tool towards education, community development, and social inclusion. After the first edition the bulk of the material will be subtitled and posted in the 4CapoeiraThoughts youtube channel as an open resource for the Capoeira community. In order to accomplish the project more quickly and embrace a wider range of languages subtitles we adopted an ‘open-source’ approach. If you would like to participate in the project, at this stage we are looking for people to help with transcriptions and translations. So far the project is dealing with English and Portuguese transcriptions, after this first moment we will be able to translate into other languages.
So far I have been approaching Capoeira traditions and philosophy, and criticizing the ulterior motives underpinning traditionalism (not traditions).
In this post I would like to share two important statements in video from two renowned Mestres supporting my line of thoughts so far. The first statement was taken from the documentary movie Capoeiragem na Bahia (IRDEB/TVE, 2000) and features Mestre Acordeon discussing traditions and changes in Capoeira over time. In the second one you will see Mestre Cláudio Danadinho addressing Capoeira’s inner principles within the institutional movie Volta Por Cima – Capoeira, Educação e Cultura.
I sincerely hope that these video clips helps your understanding of both the dangers of traditionalism and the importance of seeking philosophical concepts as wise means supporting your quest for truthful knowledge in the Art-form. (more…)
