Rafael AndradeFreshman – Section 1March, 28th 2011Research Paper Essay: First Draft

The Brazilian Capoeira

Known for the world at first under the concept of ritual dance, the Capoeira

contains in it bases the aspects of a ritual dance, but more than that it is a combination

between fight and the mandinga1. The Capoeira was created by the Africans slaves of

Brazil back in the XVII century when the Portuguese start to carry slaves from Africa to

Brazil. The capoeira was to the slaves a way to defend themselves from the oppressors. The

Capoeira it does not an evolution from some Angolan tradition or a sudden reaction from

the slaves to the oppressors but it does have relation with the capoeira. The Capoeira it is,

like Rosario says, known for some people like a dance or an atrial mart or a sport for other

people (104), all over the world, it so recognized in many countries that already have it

owns world championship. But we can not talk about the Capoeira without talk about the

meaning that have for some people, a great example of that are the “Mestres”2. All over the

world many people who practice the Capoeira express how important is the Capoeira for

they lives, like Monica Rector put in her work, “For me, Capoeira is a way of living that,

in addition to the physical benefits of its practice, has given me a clearer vision and better

perspective on the game of life, and a strategy to face the contradictions of the world.

Almeida (1981, p. 17)”. Even if is a very uncommon art for a lot of people, the Capoeira

has been growing up, and it is making a big impact in more and more countries, not only in

America or Africa but also in Europe and some Oriental countries as well. In 2008 the

1 Mandinga: cunning, malice.2 Mestres are teachers of the capoeira, the greatest of the capoeira

international federation of Capoeira made the first world championship of Capoeira, and it

has been doing it every year since that. The Capoeira is a beautiful dance, but lot more than

that just a dance is a martial art, is a fight, an expression of the person and is a life style that

must be more recognized around the world by the good influence over the people whom

practices this remarkable art.

The Capoeira it does not began being what we know now in these days, the

Capoeira is a kind of evolution and result of some significant situations which affected a

big number of Africans, principally the Angolan people. When the Portuguese come to

America they underwent the natives of the area were they arrived, but when they tried to

expand their domain inland, they realized that they needed more labor than what they had

in that moment. They start brought from other of their colonies, Angola, more slaves in

order to domain the new piece of continent they were conquering. In Angola, the native

people had their own traditions and believe, such as dances, rituals, gods and other. A few

traditions were tolerated by the Portuguese and of those were their traditional dances, but

things like rituals, religions the language were not allow to perform neither in public nor

hide; apart this, like was common in that age, the salves were forced to work for the

Portuguese in almost every field able to work and even some dangerous works that even the

Portuguese did not want to do, like some dangerous constructions. But the slaves conserved

their original believes, or what they could conserved; then was when the slaves start to turn

the pure dance into a way to fight, a way to defend themself from the abuse of Portuguese,

but this fur sure was going to be a provocation against the Portuguese, that could only make

the situation worst for the slaves and besides that they can not always used it to protect an

slave because it probably would make notice that they can defend themselves; or even

practice this in private could carried the risk of being catches and probably condemned to

death. The way of the salves in Brazil to avoid the penalization for doing that was to do the

practice between the dense vegetation of the tropical forest of Brazil; they made a clear area

with the form of a circle in the middle of the vegetation, that when it appears the Capoeira,

like “Asoiciación Argentina de Capoeira” tells, in Tupí language Capoeira (kapu´era)

means “clear in the bushes”. The vegetation not only hides the clear area but also the

people who were in the clear area, practicing the fight. Eventually they figured out how to

practice the Capoeira in front of the Portuguese without being punished nor even caught for

doing that; was possible thanks to the relation of the dance and the Capoeira, because they

did all the moves of the fight inside the dance, and thanks to the versatility of the Capoeira,

the dance look just like an extravagant way to move and dance.

The Capoeira is based in extravagant movements, trick the opponent and cunning.

The movement of the Capoeira (Rector 192 and Asoiciación Argentina de Capoeira) it can

be resume in this formula: balance=gravity → rebalance=neutrality → imbalance=lack of

gravity; or can be expressed like this as well: provocation-attack-defense-counterattack.

The Capoeira is not a fake entertainment, it is a dance/martial-art fueled with the

power for freedom, print in this dance/martial-art by the Brazilian slaves whom proclaim

their freedom, as well it can apply to our owns lives, not for release us for some tyrant, but

for our inners-oppressors, with all the principles of the Capoeira we can reach a better life

for our body, our relations and our soul.

Rafael AndradeCathy BlandonFreshman – Section 1April, 11th 2011

Work Cited

“Asociacion Argentina De Capoeira”. 2006. Web. 27 Mar. 2011.

<http://www.capoeira.com.ar/pan_cultura.htm>.

Ciurba, Katie. "Dance... Fight...Play... Capceira!." Faces (07491387) 25.5 (2009):

12. MasterFILE Premier. EBSCO. Web. 26 Mar. 2011.

de Campos Rosario, Claudio, Neil Stephens, and Sara Delamont. "I'm Your Teacher, I'm

Brazilian!" Authenticity and Authority in European "Capoeira." Sport, Education

and Society 15.1 (2010): 103-120.ERIC. EBSCO. Web. 11 Apr. 2011.

Rector, Mónica, and Luis Ignacio Sierra Gutiérrez. "Capoeira: El lenguaje silencioso de

los gestos. (Spanish)." Signo y Pensamiento 27.52 (2008): 184-194. Fuente Académica.

EBSCO. Web. 20 Marr. 2011.