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Capoeira And Candomble: Conformity And Resistance in Brazil

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Manufacturer: Markus Wiener Publishers
List Price: $69.95
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Average Customer Ratings:

Capoeira is a unique music-dance-sport-play activity created by African slaves, and Candomble is a hybrid religion combining Catholic and African beliefs and practices. And while there are numerous books on Candomble and kindred Afro-American religions, none of them effectively combines Candomble and Capoeira. Actually, Capoeira and Candomble are closely tied to one another. Together, they make up a coherent form of life in Brazil within the current process of globalization about which there has been much ballyhoo, eulogies, and condemnation. This study involves the author's practice of and reflections on the arts of Capoeira and Candomble; it culminates in the idea of an "other logic," an alternative culture "logic," about which much lip service is being paid in academic circles, with little to no concrete details. This book, consequently, is one of a kind insofar as it bears on the interdependency of two Afro-Brazilian practices while grounding them in a theoretical framework and at the same time interrelating them with topics of great concern in the initial years of a new millennium: post-colonial and diaspora studies.


DESCRIPTION:

Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 299.6730981
EAN: 9781558763494
ISBN: 155876349X
Label: Markus Wiener Publishers
Manufacturer: Markus Wiener Publishers
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 317
Publication Date: 2005-07
Publisher: Markus Wiener Publishers
Studio: Markus Wiener Publishers


SIMILAR ITEMS:

• Capoeira: A Brazilian Art Form: History, Philosophy, and Practice
• Capoeira: The History of Afro-Brazilian Martial Art (Sport in the Global Society, 45)
• Secrets, Gossip, and Gods: The Transformation of Brazilian Candomble
• A Street-Smart Song: Capoeira Philosophy and Inner Life
• Learning Capoeira: Lessons in Cunning from an Afro-Brazilian Art


CUSTOMER REVIEWS:

Customer Rating:
Summary: "It's in their bones": Merrell's essentialist and superficial account of capoeira, candomblé, and Brazilian "nature".
Comment: Merrell's generalizations about Brazilian culture are essentialist and simplistic. The examples he uses to support his analysis of "what makes Brazil Brazil" (255) often come from Brazilian novels and even from TV Globo's telenovelas-- highly dubious sources of Brazilian reality. Merrell concludes that Brazilians are illogical, and that we (for him, they) "use this illogical logic at the drop of a hat, because it's second nature to them; it's in their bones, so to speak" (236). These kinds of statements, where Brazilians are othered as irrational, overly physical beings, can be found in every chapter of this book. As a Brazilian, I found Merrell's book deeply offensive.
Merrell sexualizes and exoticizes Brazilian culture through his choice of adjectives to describe samba, capoeira, and candomblé: samba is "sensuous," "feverish" and "erotic" (126); one of the stages of learning capoeira is described by the gerunds "twirling," "gyrating," "scintillating," "vibrating" and "undulating" (88). In Merrell's capoeira, the instruments "throb" and the vocal chords "chant" (83), and "you throw your body around with reckless abandon, and with neither inhibition nor fear" (81). Capoeira is "vague and imprecise" (68), it is "uninhibited freedom" (67) and it is "indescribable" (54). In capoeira, "you're not supposed to think" (83), the player is "completely spontaneous" (65) and there are no rules: according to Merrel's definition, play is "disrespectful of all boundaries" (46), and "capoeira is play, play in the most profound sense" (47). It is hard to believe that this rhetoric, where the mover "gyrates" with "reckless abandon" while the instruments "throb" and where the dance is "feverish" and "erotic" is coming from a book published in the 21st century. It often reads like the travelogue of a European colonizer describing the illogical but titillating ways of the "primitive natives" of the New World.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Neither insightful nor complete
Comment: This book offers neither historical information nor insightful commentary. The only thing unique I can see is the combining of Capoeira and Candomble references into one book and even that is questionable as the two are isolated in separate sections.

Floyd Merrell's writing lacks any tidbits of historical significance. His perspective on Capoeira is so biased pro Angola that he misrepresents Capoeira as a whole. This includes his beloved Angola, which he does not appear to understand so much as he believes. He falls for a trap that many authors of Capoeira literature fall for, obsessing over the idea that Capoeira is difficult to understand. He then proceeds to explain Capoeira and Candomble using the most artificially built up confusing language that he can muster making the topic even less clear. Over and over he slips back and forth saying Capoeira is like this but not like this but it is like this or not really like this but it looks like this.
etc.
etc.

This is also one of the most blatant cases of reverse racism I have ever seen. Mr. Merrell idolizes African's and Afro-Brazilians. He paints the origins of not only Capoeira and Candomble but of Afro-Brazilian society as a whole, as systematic and deliberate.

This would probably have been a great paper, if it had been something less that 40 pages. Don't expect to learn anything about either Capoeira or Candomble. If you want some deep and often redundant insight on Floyd Merrell's opinions regarding the two topics in the title then by all means pick up this little gem. I'm sure it would be a great gift for his mother or brother. Everyone else will find it boring, self gratifying and pedantic.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Playing in the "bodymindspirit"
Comment: Merrell's book offers a fresh perspective on the tradition of capoeira, particularly with his emphasis on the influences of candomble. Merrell builds upon and references Mestre Acordeon's often-cited insights (of "playing in the dark," "playing in water," "playing in the light," "playing with the crystal ball," and "playing in the mind"), attempting to explain to readers the feel and power of "playing in the bodymindspirit." For those who like pondering ways of being (i.e, notions of "becoming," of ambiguity, and of the processual)--and I do--this work is truly enjoyable. While this book may be a bit weighty or academically abstract and philosophical for some capoeiristas' tastes, Merrrell's work fills an important niche in 8-10 top books in English written on the subject. As but one example of his scholarly flights of imagination, see his handling of Exu, trickster by default, and the complexities of moving beyond "either/or" and "both/and" thinking to a third way of thinking, or "thirdness." Expect coverage of complex topics, a bit of "jargon" (appropriate for a scholarly work well-informed by years of research in Latin American history)--and you'll be rewarded with a book that makes you go "hmmmmmm." Axe ASCAB
Customer Rating:
Summary: Capoeira and Candomble
Comment: Capoeira is a unique music-dance-sport-play activity created by African slaves, and Candomblé is a hybrid religion combining Catholic and African beliefs and practices. And while there are numerous books on Candomblé and kindred Afro-American religions, none of them effectively combines Candomblé and Capoeira. Actually, Capoeira and Candomblé are closely tied to one another. Together, they make up a coherent form of life in Brazil within the current process of globalization about which there has been much ballyhoo, eulogies, and condemnation.
This study involves the author's practice of and reflections on the arts of Capoeira and Candomblé; it culminates in the idea of an "other logic," an alternative culture "logic," about which much lip service is being paid in academic circles, with little to no concrete details.
This book, consequently, is one of a kind insofar as it bears on the interdependency of two Afro-Brazilian practices while grounding them in a theoretical framework and at the same time interrelating them with topics of great concern in the initial years of a new millennium: post-colonial and diaspora studies.

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