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ABOUT CAPOEIRA: THE GAME OF "VADIAÇÃO"
FROM BAHIA, BRAZIL
VADIAÇÃO NA BAHIA
(Pierre Verger, c. 1940s)
This article is based on original research conducted by Ed Luna, founder and longtime trainer of T.A.B.C.A.T. Columbus, over an almost eight-year period of study in Capoeira under Mestre Caboquinho (2002–2010). This work was also done in partial fulfillment of a Master's Degree in Dance from Ohio State. It necessarily represents a limited slice of the author's personal experience and wider research up until about 2008–2009. The author dedicates this article to José Dantas de Serrinha (Grand Mestre of T.A.B.C.A.T.) and João Pereira dos Santos (Mestre João Pequeno).
CAPOEIRA
(kah-PWEH-dah) is an ambiguous, ambivalent movement form
historically performed by African men and their descendants
in Brazil. As just one of many expressions of what is now called
Afro-Brazilian culture, Capoeira embodies the diverse
experiences of a community that has survived more than four
centuries of slavery, marginalization, and cultural colonization.
Throughout this history, Capoeira has been performed in many ways. It has been a subversive
dance, an evasive form of self-defense, a strutting acrobatic
display, an urban street-fighting form, a semi-competitive game,
a trick, a joke, and an idle pastime (or vadiação)
associated with dock workers, rogues, and vagabonds. More recently,
it has been transformed into a modern, multivalent art form,
synthesizing many or all of these aspects for contemporary purposes.
Among the many present-day iterations of Capoeira, however, Capoeira Angola, from
the Brazilian state of Bahia, has tended to resist the reflexive
modernization and streamlined pedagogy that has turned Capoeira
into an international martial art and sport. Among Capoeira Angola practitioners, there are still a few who have continued, despite some streamlining of their own, to practice the form as
a secretive, streetwise tradition passed down semi-formally
from one practitioner to another. Capoeira Angola thus self-consciously connects itself to a history that can be traced locally to the late 1800s, and indirectly hundreds of years
earlier to Africa itself. As such, Capoeira Angola positions itself as an authentic
cultural tradition rooted in communal memory
and Afro-Brazilian (or specifically, Afro-Bahian) identity.
It is this unique art that the TRIBO
AFRO BAHIANA DE CAPOEIRA ANGOLA TRADICIONAL (T.A.B.C.A.T.)
is dedicated to upholding.
ORIGINS
The origins of Capoeira have long been shrouded in mystery. As a bodily practice, it has left no artifacts. Occasional references to similar dances, martial arts, and movement forms can be gleaned from the literature of travelers' accounts throughout the centuries, here and there, but for most of its history, Capoeira has remained elusive and evasive. It has been further distorted by the vagaries of oral history, which has revealed something about the inner philosophies and ethics of the form, but has not proven to be a "reliable" source of historical data. Indeed, there are simply no primary sources about Capoeira—no documentation from practitioners themselves at all—until the early 1900s, and little of reliable value until the 1930s. Filling the rest of this enormous gap, covering centuries of Brazilian and African history, therefore requires informed, careful speculation and inference from the information we do have access to.
As a starting point,
Capoeira is often linked—directly or indirectly—to a number
of dance-fighting games, challenge dances, and warrior arts
found throughout Bantu-speaking areas of Africa, especially
the West Central African regions known today as Angola, the Congo,
and Mozambique. These are the same areas from which a large
percentage of Africans were ruthlessly taken and transported to Brazil
at the height of the slave trade (roughly speaking, from the 17th to the 19th centuries), so the connection is a sensible one.
THE ENGOLO (OR N'GOLO)
(Drawings by Neves e Sousa, 1965)
Yet it is also true that these African forms, like Africa itself, have undergone radical
transformation in the last several centuries. Given that, a handful of traditional
dance-fighting games found throughout Africa in recent years might give some indication of the flavor of Capoeira's earlier antecedents. These include the oft-cited
engolo of southwest Angola, the moringue
of Madagascar, the dundunba of Guinea's Mandinka, and the
hiowolan, or Dance of the Yokia, recently witnessed in southeast Guinea. To differing degrees, these forms are performed under conditions similar to that of Capoeira. They are surrounded by a circle of observers, often accompanied by music, and are usually framed as combative or ritualized contests. Many of them also utilize a repertoire of movements similar to those found in Capoeira, such as acrobatic
leaps, headbutts, kicks, and leg sweeps, often done to mimic the movements of animals. Such movements likely connect to earlier forms and African movement tendencies that were brought to Brazil centuries before.
'A NEGRO FIGHT IN SOUTH AMERICA' (VENEZUELA)
(Etching of a head-butting contest between slaves in Harper's Weekly, 1874)
Whatever their specific origins, it is clear that African dance-fighting
games were adapted and reframed to the
New World context in various ways. Although few have been described or named in any kind of rigorous way, dance-fighting
games have been a recurring element in African communities all over the Americas. Among the ones that are somewhat better known are an old tripping/punching
game performed in rural Cuba, called maní (or "peanuts") that survived into the twentieth century but has apparently died out. In Martinique, the percussive kicking
sport l'adja/danmye was documented only in the 1930s, but it is still widely performed today. In the southern USA, the combative, secretive form usually referred to as
"knocking and kicking" has been noted in the literature since the early 1800s, and it is said to survive in some form even now. Ongoing research will undoubtedly offer
interesting clues to the origins of these forms and the manner in which they were
both continued and adapted to new conditions throughout the
Americas. However, few of these arts (with the possible exception
of l'adja) appear to have reached the level of complexity
achieved by Capoeira in Brazil.
In addition, there are many other dances, games, and movement
practices performed by Africans, Europeans, and Amerindians—most
notably stick-fighting and wrestling—whose influence has yet to
be properly examined. Further research
will no doubt unearth surprising links between these various
forms.
MAP OF THE QUILOMBO BURACO DO TATU
(Near Salvador, Bahia, 1763)
Some of these dance-fighting games were likely used in a more combative context, in prize fights between
rival slaves (see Harper's Weekly illustration above), or as one of many guerilla tactics available
to rebel or runaway slaves. Throughout the history of colonization, slaves were notorious for escaping and setting up temporary
backland communities. In Brazil, these were called mocambos or quilombos. Such communities were often little more than improvised camps, but occasionally they organized themselves to the size of small cities—as in the case of the storied, somewhat mythologized Quilombo dos Palmares, an enormous community that had military rankings, wide-ranging circles of trade, and survived numerous Dutch and Portuguese incursions throughout the 1600s. Whatever their size, these communities were considered a very real threat by European colonists, even as they also served a different need for Africans themselves. The backland communities were improvised, symbolic spaces of African resistance where African cultural and martial arts (and their new African-American hybrids) could be practiced openly. It seems likely that the techniques of various African martial arts would have been an appropriate part of the defensive culture of these communities, even if there is currently no solid evidence to substantiate this. It also seems likely, and ironic, that some of the slave
hunters (known in Brazil as
capitães-de-mato) sent to capture these runaways were Africans would themselves have been versed in African martial forms.
The enlistment of African-born (or African-descended) slave hunters also points to one of the many strategies available to Africans in the face of the slavery system. Overt resistance by slaves was often answered with harsh measures. Death, imprisonment,
or physical punishment were integral aspects of the colonial landscape. All too often, Africans responded to this by giving in to despair, and taking drastic steps such as committing suicide or killing their own children to prevent them from having to endure such a miserable existence. The other alternative was to somehow conform to the oppressive
system. Those who chose conformity did so in various ways. Some slaves gave in entirely, seeking advantages for themselves by signing on to be informants or even oppressors, if conditions allowed it. Others merely feigned cooperation while looking for ways to undermine their intolerable circumstances, or, as was somewhat more common in Brazil than in the USA, to wait to purchase one's own freedom through manumission.
In exchange for the apparent acquiescence of slaves, it was common for owners to allow Africans to conduct their cacophonous revels during rest days and religious
festivals. This was done as much to allow slaves to blow off steam as it was to placate the Church's desire to allow slaves to celebrate Christian feast days. However, these events, consisting of ritual dance circles, contests, and music that lasted well into the night, were very West and West Central African in flavor. They also offended European sensibilities to the point where they wrote about the revels in a dismissive tone, ironically providing us with some of the few descriptions we have of African cultural expression of that period. In addition, these events also encouraged Africans to begin letting go of traditional tribal and ethnic affiliations in favor of a more blended African identity, giving rise to uniquely African-American forms.
In Brazil, these late-night celebrations were collectively known as batuques, a derisive term that translates as "noise-making." These gatherings gave rise to what would eventually become known as the samba and other dances that have given Brazilian popular culture its distinctly African aesthetic.
As for Capoeira, it seems that something like it—performed as an ambivalent form somewhere
between a game, dance, and fight—would have been ideally suited
to channel the violence of slavery to more life-affirming purposes.
UNCERTAINTIES
Thanks to the work of anthropologists, ethnographers, historians, and dance scholars over the last hundred years, a great deal is now known about the historical context of slave life in Brazil. Unfortunately, as was said at the outset of this article, the actual appearance and development of Capoeira has remained uniquely difficult to trace. Attempts to do so have remained highly speculative.
As noted earlier, recent evidence has appeared to strongly suggest that peoples from specific regions of Africa contributed
specific movements or philosophies to the game (most notably, the contemporary Angolan fighting sport engolo, which superficially resembles Capoeira in some important ways). But it is still somewhat premature to claim that these are part of an uninterrupted continuity of African dance-fighting practices, with Capoeira as its most recent iteration, when Africa (as also noted earlier) has undergone many transformations in the last few decades alone. For now, these intriguing connections to African forms of today should probably be thought in terms of parallel development, not as "direct" antecedents, to minimize the temptation of projecting present-day concerns onto the past.
In addition, it is well known that through the centuries, slave traders had little
concern for the humanity of their "cargo," so they customarily defined Africans by their point of departure, not their actual
origin. This makes historical attempts to trace specific practices to specific parts of Africa a hazardous affair, especially so many years after the fact. Moreover, the linkage of Capoeira with Angola, as
well as cultural affinities in Brazil to the spiritual beliefs of the nearby Kongo, are often Brazilian developments that may in fact have little to do with those regions. Fascinating—and better documented—connections between West African religious practices in Brazil (the famous candomblé and macumba, which have direct origins in the orixá religions of present-day Benin, Togo, and Nigeria, as exhaustively documented by the ethnologist Pierre Verger) were of a later period in the slave trade, and there appears to be little overlap in movement styles of that area of Africa (which tends to prefer wrestling forms) to Capoeira, which eschews physical contact. It should also be said that in spite of the very real connections to Africa, African ethnicities,
in Brazil as well as Africa itself, have been quite fluid throughout history, making hard-and-fast claims that Capoeira "came" from one area or ethnic group or another difficult to sustain.
To add to this difficulty, the etymology of the very word "Capoeira" is
equally problematic. Its most likely origin is
from the native Brazilian Tupi word for "burned forest",
but the word is also is used in Portuguese to describe a chicken
coop, or a kind of military dugout. It is even possible that "Capoeira" may
have been derived from one of the many African languages
brought to Brazil, which have lent many words to Brazilian Portuguese.
More problematically, it seems likely that Capoeira itself (or at least, certain
aspects of it) was known by other names long before it was associated with the word "Capoeira." All of this suggests that a determined search for the word may not provide many answers about the movement form itself.
NINETEENTH-CENTURY CAPOEIRA
JOGAR CAPOEIRA, ou danse de la
guerre
(J. M. Rugendas, Rio
de Janeiro, c. 1830s)
With the first written notices connecting the word "Capoeira" to black slave culture, the picture becomes slightly more clear. The word first appears in the colonial and police records of
late 1700s and early 1800s Rio de Janeiro, the elegant second capital
of Brazil.
By the 1820s, Capoeira was described by European travelers' accounts as a
bloody "war dance" (as Rugendas notes above) practiced by African street thugs, also known
as Capoeiras. In the increasingly urban context of Rio de Janeiro (which also served as the heart of the Portuguese Empire from 1815–1821), Capoeira became associated with
semi-organized street gangs known as maltas. The practice was legally designated as Capoeiragem, or the practice of
Capoeira, and it soon became synonymous with criminality and public disorder nationwide. Capoeira was further portrayed as an integral aspect of African cultural expression, which was negatively caricatured as an uninhibited, animalistic free-for-all in which African slaves ran rampant in the streets. Slave culture thus presented a very palpable threat to law and order and the emerging Brazilian state.
As if to confirm this, by mid-century, reports of Capoeira gangs of various sizes began to pour in from all over the Brazilian Empire: from Salvador (Bahia) and
Recife (Pernambuco) in the northeast, to São Luis (Maranhão) in the north, and
even Sorocaba (São Paulo) in the south. Of course, this does not tell us much about the diffusion of Capoeira (performed as a game) throughout Brazil. As has already been suggested, something like Capoeira may have already been present in those areas for many decades—especially in the old capital of Bahia—but it may have not been known by that name. Likewise, the presence of Capoeira "gangs" does not necessarily indicate the presence of the game itself. Whatever the case, various local statutes were passed throughout the middle 1800s, designed to prohibit public gatherings and African dancing. These were enforced haphazardly, and were therefore ineffective in wiping out the Capoeiras.
In the 1860s, there was an unprecedented event, a war that pitted the so-called Triple Alliance of Brazil, Uruguay, and Argentina against the militarized state of Paraguay. Lacking much military capability, Brazil called up a number of African slaves to form fighting units under the promise of freedom after the war. The war brought renown to several of these Afro-Brazilian units (who were said to have employed some Capoeira-like strategies in their fighting arsenal), and also brought them in contact with other parts of Brazil. After the war ended in 1870, many of these soldiers were given their freedom, but not a livelihood, so most of them died in obscurity.
It took another two decades for Brazil to formally end the practice of slavery (1888), and establish the Brazilian Republic (1889). Throughout this period, Rio de Janeiro was a hotbed of political activity. Capoeiras, known for their fighting prowess (and for having defended their country), were often hired by the Monarchists, and less often by Republican factions, as strongarms and political enforcers in local elections. This was the period during which the Capoeiras reached their peak of activity, and about which the most documentation about their activities has survived. Thanks to comparative analysis of incarceration rates, for example, it is now known that a larger number of lighter-skinned men of mixed ancestry and European immigrants became associated with the art. The newly-arrived Europeans, many of them Portuguese, and almost as destitute as the newly-freed Afro-Brazilians, vied for positions in the underworld and brought their own fighting practices with them.
Again, most of this documentation is of a legal nature, and does not tell us much about the physical practice of Capoeira. But it was certainly not an exclusively criminal or thuggish pastime. Some of the same Capoeiras
caught for petty crime, for example, could also be found heading parade-like processions and
religious festivals. A number of Capoeiras were said to be acrobats and dancers of the highest order (much like today). A few, like the impeccably dressed fish peddler known as Manduca da Praia, even became folk figures or anti-heroes, exemplifying the Brazilian archetype of the smooth criminal, or malandro, inspiring pulp novels and serials to the present day.
Despite their double-edged charms, the Capoeiras eventually fell victim to targeted persecution. Because many Capoeiras had worked with the Monarchists, the new Republic felt the need to eliminate them once and for all. In 1890, only months after the new government took hold, a new criminal code singled out Capoeiragem as a particular menace to society. A wave of brutal persecution followed.
In Rio itself, the prolific presence of the Capoeiras made them easy to round up, and in the span of just one year of overzealous enforcement under police chief Sampaio Ferraz, hundreds of Capoeiras were imprisoned. After one or two decades of less intense enforcement, Capoeira slowly faded to become an obscure underground art. A few of its movements survived into the twentieth century as part of the training regimens of military
academies or under sportsmen such as Sinhozinho, but its uniquely African, game like character was all but eliminated. A few roguish characters continued to use Capoeira in the marginal favela neighborhoods, most famously Madame
Satã (the samba dancer and unrepentant transvestite who was the subject of a recent film of the same name). But few—if any—of these streetwise malandros passed the tradition on to the next generation.
Other local variants of Capoeira found in
the rest of the country appear to have suffered a similar fate, and any remnants which remained were destined
to be replaced by a revitalized Bahian capoeira in the 1950s.
SALVADOR, PELOURINHO DISTRICT
(c. 1850s)
By contrast, in the former capital of Salvador, Bahia, and its surrounding
sugarcane-rich recôncavo region, Capoeira defied
the trend towards extermination. This seems to have been at least partially the result
of inconsistent enforcement of the 1890 prohibition in the area, as well
as the geographic diversity of the Bay of All Saints region.
Furthermore, in Salvador, the maltas never reached
the level of organization that they did in Rio, so no equivalent
"purge" of capoeira had been necessary.
In the lore of the region, it is also said that Bahian capoeira took on a more deliberate appearance
of a game—known colloquially as vadiação,
or simply "idling"—by appropriating instruments
such as drums, tambourines, bells, and an ancient Angolan bow
instrument called the berimbau into a formalized orchestra.
In Rio's Capoeira, musical accompaniment had also been present on some occasions, most likely in the form of drums (as seen in the Rugendas lithograph reproduced above). The berimbau
was also linked to parallel activities such as the batuque. But it was only in Bahia that music became such a central and highly visible part of the practice, and this centrality has been maintained into the present. Under the guise of culture, then, Bahian Capoeira became less of a combative, criminal form, and more of a symbol of the playful subterfuge and resilience necessary
for everyday survival among Afro-Brazilians. The stage was therefore set for the folklorization of the form.
EARLY
TWENTIETH-CENTURY BAHIAN CAPOEIRA
THE BARRACÃO OF MESTRE WALDEMAR
(Salvador, Bahia,
c. 1950s)
Many mysterious figures inhabited the world of Bahian Capoeira
in the early twentieth century. Among them was the legendary
Besouro Mangangá from Santo Amaro, named
for his ability to transform himself into a beetle to avoid
capture by the police. He was also known for having a corpo
fechado (or "closed body") invulnerable to harm
by metal. It is said that he was only killed (c. 1924) by being
stabbed with a knife made of tucum wood.
Other streetwise mestres (master-teachers) of Bahian Capoeira performed open
rodas (Capoeira circles) at various religious celebrations
and in outlying neighborhoods. In times of greater persecution, these men collaborated with sympathetic
local authorities—some of whom were Capoeiras
themselves—or sought refuge in houses of the Afro-Brazilian
religion candomblé.
This is the period that remains, even today, a living memory from which most present-day forms of Capoeira were derived. Adepts taught the secrets of their art quietly and informally, in back rooms,
behind closed bars, and in backyard patios—often one student at
a time.
Among these adepts was a small, slender young man named Vicente Ferreira Pastinha (1889–1981), later known
simply as Mestre Pastinha, who was an indispensable figure in the diffusion and maintenance of Capoeira tradition from this legendary period.
MESTRE
BIMBA AND CAPOEIRA REGIONAL
"IT'S NOT EASY TO GRAB A CAPOEIRISTA..."
(Article about Mestre Bimba, Salvador, 1930s)
Another one of these Capoeiras, Manuel dos Reis Machado, nicknamed Mestre Bimba
(1899–1974), also came of age in this period. In his 20s, after playing and teaching
in the traditional style for years, Mestre Bimba became dissatisfied with the marginalized status and
informal teaching style of Capoeira. In his view, Capoeira was degenerating into a weak, folkloric pastime. By the late 1920s, Bimba decided
to create a new, streamlined, Afro-Bahian fighting form based on Capoeira. Initially, he called
his form the luta regional baiana (or "regional
fight of Bahia") to distinguish his form from the wider practice, and to avoid its illegality.
In the 1930s, he founded one of the earliest formal academies
in this style of Capoeira, called the Centro de Cultura Física Regional
(CCFR), which was the first to be recognized by the Brazilian
government. This recognition—although only applicable
to "official" sport institutions like his—nevertheless
paved the way for the eventual decriminalization of Capoeira
altogether.
Under his strict leadership and standardized teaching methods,
the luta regional became increasingly popular among the lighter-skinned
middle classes and professionals, first in Salvador, and later
throughout Brazil. Bimba's Capoeira Regional (as it was increasingly becoming known) took only a few years to become the dominant form of Capoeira
by the 1950s. This was thanks to a series of challenge matches and
public demonstrations that further legitimized his form of Capoeira as both a
fighting style and a uniquely expressive cultural practice. Capoeira Regional thus largely replaced whatever remnants of local Capoeira
may have still existed outside of Bahia.
CAPOEIRA
ANGOLA AND THE RETURN OF MESTRE PASTINHA
CAPOEIRA GAME
(Salvador, Bahia, c. 1940s)
With the rise of Capoeira Regional, the traditional
practice of Capoeira became known more often as Capoeira Angola,
as a nod to the legendary origins of the practice. Among
the many mestres who played and taught Capoeira Angola
in this golden era (c. 1920–1960), were such men as Daniel
Noronha, Maré, Samuel Querido de Deus, Waldemar da Paixão,
Canjiquinha, Caiçara, and Cobrinha Verde. One famous
description in the 1930s by the anthropologist Ruth Landes paints a vivid picture of a game
between the boatman Querido de Deus ("Beloved of God")
and another Capoeirista named Onça Preta ("Black
Jaguar"):
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Beloved of God swayed on his haunches
while he faced his opponent with a grin and gauged his chances.
The fight involved all parts of the body except the hands,
a precaution demanded by the police to obviate harm. As
the movements followed the musical accompaniment, they flowed
into a slow-motion, dreamlike sequence that was more a dancing
than a wrestling. As the law stipulated that capoeirists
must not hurt each other, blows become acrobatic stances
whose balancing scored in the final check-up, and were named
and classified. Various types of capoeira had evolved, with
subtleties in the forms and sequences of the blows and in
the styles of playing the berimbau.
Beloved was prodigiously agile in the difficult formal encounters
with his adversary, and he smiled constantly while the ritual
songs droned on…
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MESTRE PASTINHA
(Pierre Verger, Salvador, Bahia, c. 1940s)
But above all, it was Mestre Pastinha who would become the most
widely known protector of traditional Capoeira. In the 1940s,
Pastinha emerged from thirty years of semi-retirement to open his
own academy, the Centro Esportivo de Capoeira Angola (CECA), seemingly following Mestre Bimba's example.
Unlike the CCFR, however, the CECA only linked Capoeira to the ethics and aesthetics of sports for convenience (by dressing in football soccer jerseys and the yellow and black colors of Mestre Pastinha's favorite team, the Esporte Clube Ypiranga, for example), but the real goal was to maintain the rituals and culture of Bahian Capoeira, thought of as "regulations"
of the game.
Guided by his gentle demeanor, informal teaching style, and
philosophical spirit, Pastinha's academy became an important
focal point for Capoeira Angola, and Bahian culture in
general. Whereas other mestres in the peripheral neighborhoods could run their own shows, Mestre Pastinha's location in the
centralized Pelourinho district attracted traditionalist Capoeiristas
from all over the city and by the 1960s, a number of tourists. His welcoming attitude ensured that
many diverse traditions of vadiação would
be given continuity.
Among the many accolades he received, perhaps none was greater
than the opportunity to present Capoeira in Africa for the first time. In 1966,
at the age of 77, Mestre Pastinha's group performed Capoeira
Angola as part of the Brazilian delegation to the First
Festival for Negro Arts in Dakar, Senegal.
THE PROLIFERATION AND COMMODIFICATION
OF CAPOEIRA REGIONAL
DANCEBRAZIL
(Photo by Lois Greenfield, c. 1990s)
In the meantime, a group of young Capoeira enthusiasts in Rio
de Janeiro (some of them originally from Bahia) pioneered an even
more stylized version of Capoeira Regional that incorporated
extreme acrobatics, techniques from other martial arts (such
as vale tudo, or free-for-all fighting), and rankings
based on rope cords, or cordões. This is the form of Capoeira most in evidence today.
The most prominent of these groups has been the Grupo Senzala,
formed in the mid 1960s. Armed with this new, more competitive
form, this style of Capoeira—often called "Capoeira
Contemporânea"—eventually took the country
and the world by storm. Through large organizations (whose members
number in the tens of thousands), tournaments, and
public demonstrations, the Grupo Senzala and its offshoots,
such as ABADÁ-Capoeira and Omulu, have remained among the
most dominant forces in Capoeira.
Coincidentally or not, commercial interests have found this flashy and somewhat "de-Africanized"
type of Capoeira the easiest to market, utilizing it in advertisements
for Nokia and the BBC, and featuring it in mainstream films
such as Only the Strong (1993) and Ocean's Twelve
(2004). The game company Namco also famously motion-captured
Capoeira to create the characters of Eddy Gordo
and Christie Monteiro for their Tekken series of
fighting games. Capoeira has also become a stage-friendly form,
providing movements for dance choreographers from Cirque du
Soleil to Jelon Vieira's DanceBrazil.
Capoeira has also been promoted as an efficient system of self-defense,
taught alongside Brazilian jujitsu, karate,
boxing, and vale tudo. It is even being
taught as an aerobic workout equivalent to Tae Bo (under
such names such as Capoeira Workout, Capoeirobics, Cardio Capoeira,
or CapoFit).
CAPOEIRA REGIONAL
(Recent postcard from Salvador, Bahia)
With so much emphasis on modernization, innovation, and efficiency,
this "contemporary" style of Capoeira has become a
truly international sport and martial art. With the increasing
social acceptance of this traditionally male art,
women have also become more and more visible in Capoeira. A
few—such as Mestrandas Edna Lima and Cigana of ABADÁ—have
already achieved higher ranks in Capoeira Contemporânea.
In this process, however, Capoeira has also become somewhat
of a packageable commodity. Like Carmen Miranda, bossa nova music, and football
soccer, Capoeira is often just another "sign" of Brazilianness.
Much of the elegant simplicity of Mestre Bimba's original Capoeira
Regional, and the uniquely ambivalent and playful quality
of Capoeira Angola, have thus been decharacterized in this
transition.
In the case of Capoeira Regional, it was the premature death of Mestre Bimba in 1974, bitter and far away from his home state, that awakened some to this reality. A fewof Mestre Bimba's
most famous graduated students, such as the esteemed Dr. Angelo
Decânio, Jair Moura, Mestre Acordeon, and Mestre Itapoan,
have thus tried to keep the spirit of Mestre Bimba's teachings more or less intact. However,
among the hundreds of Capoeira teachers who claim to represent
Capoeira Regional today, only Bimba's own son, Mestre
Nenél, adheres strictly to the form as Bimba taught it.
THE DECLINE AND APPROPRIATION OF CAPOEIRA
ANGOLA
MESTRE CAIÇARA AND STUDENTS
(Salvador, Bahia, c. 1970s)
In the 1970s, as Capoeira Regional and its flashier offshoots began to grow exponentially,
Capoeira Angola seemed to go through a period of decline and self-doubt,
exacerbated by the sad closure of Mestre Pastinha's academy
on the Pelourinho. The government of Bahia had asked the old Mestre to temporarily
leave his space to allow for the restoration of the city's historic
central district, but instead of returning the space to him,
they transformed it into a restaurant for tourists (the SENAC)
which is still in operation today.
Some traditionalist mestres stopped teaching out of
disgust for these kinds of deceptions, as well as the exaggerated
aggression of modernized Capoeira. Others (including Mestre
Canjiquinha and Mestre Caiçara) created their own simplified
style of "show" Capoeira for folklore demonstrations.
With the death of the Mestre Pastinha in 1981, blind and
destitute at 92 years of age, it appeared that Capoeira Angola
might not survive.
A few well-meaning practitioners of "contemporary"
Capoeira, fearing the imminent extinction of the old traditions,
began to study Capoeira Angola in order to rescue the
form and enrich their own teachings. In the process, traditional
Capoeira became yet another "style" of Capoeira, especially
in Contemporânea schools, where practitioners have
either tried to integrate the two modalities into one, or to
insist that each "style" has its appropriate time
and place.
Yet from the point of view of most traditionalists,
the assimilation (or some might say colonization) of Capoeira Angola into the rhetoric
of "contemporary" Capoeira has only caused confusion,
while also demeaning and oversimplifying the complex cultural, historical,
and philosophical context of both
major forms of Bahian Capoeira.
In the case of traditional Capoeira, the overemphasis on the
visible aspects—its rituals, supposed tendency for
lower, slower movements, aesthetics of trickery, and unified
musical orchestra—has tended to reduce the deeper, more
mysterious aspects of the game to mere caricatures.
UNDERSTANDING CAPOEIRA REGIONAL
MESTRE BIMBA AND STUDENTS
(Salvador, Bahia, c. 1950s)
Likewise, the tendency to characterize Capoeira Regional
by its faster games, higher stances, streamlined pedagogy,
supposed "borrowings" from Asian martial arts, or
other modernizations have also oversimplified the deeper significance
of Mestre Bimba to Bahian culture.
Mestre Bimba was undoubtedly a fighter at heart, and often
spoke out against the traditional Capoeira of the streets.
Indeed, his Capoeira Regional had very few obvious
allusions to the rituals of traditional vadiação.
At the same time, almost everything in Capoeira Regional
was drawn directly from some aspect of Bahian Capoeira
and its culture, which also included a tripping game called
batuque and samba-de-roda. In all of this, there
are very few signs that Mestre Bimba "borrowed"
movements from other martial arts. Moreover, as a Capoeirsta,
Mestre Bimba was also reported to have played Capoeira in
the traditional way. Mestre Bimba also continued to be a master
drummer in the religion of candomblé, and even
protected many of its adherents from persecution, even while
he eschewed the use of the atabaque drum in his own
Capoeira circles.
This suggests that Mestre Bimba created his highly individualized
style of Capoeira to clarify the distinctions between his
own Afro-Bahian culture, and the new global culture of capitalism
that threatened to change it. This act of strategic and purposeful
separation is well understood by
the direct students of Mestre Bimba and traditional Capoeiristas
in Bahia today, who share a common understanding of this reasoning.
In contrast, those who advocate for a "fusion" or
"reintegration" of the two art forms—a common
theme in Capoeira Contemporânea—argue that
this division no longer serves a purpose.
THE RENOVATION AND REINVENTION OF CAPOEIRA
ANGOLA
MESTRES JOÃO PEQUENO & JOÃO
GRANDE
(Vadiação
in Europe, c. 2000)
In spite of the continued growth of Capoeira Contemporânea
throughout the world, and the assumptions that often come with
it, traditional Capoeira has remained resilient and elusive. Many of its
"secrets" are still in the hands of Bahian mestres and their students.
Mestre João Pequeno de Pastinha (1917–2011), one of
Mestre Pastinha's oldest students, was the first to take up
where the elder mestre left off, reopening the Centro
Esportivo de Capoeira Angola in 1982. He ran the revived academy for some thirty years, until his recent death in 2011 (aged 93). During those years, he nurtured a whole new generation of students—including Mestres Jogo de Dentro,
Barba Branca, Electricista, Ciro, and Professora Ritinha—and ensured the continuation of the game to which he devoted his life.
Other elder students of Mestre Pastinha, such as Mestres João
Grande (b. 1933) and Boca Rica (b. 1937?), as well as a few
younger ones such as Bola Sete (b. 1952?), have also established
their own schools. In particular, Mestre João Grande
has been one of the most prolific teachers of Capoeira Angola,
especially after establishing his academy in New York City around
1992.
Mestre João Grande was also a central figure in the more self-conscious
reinvention of Capoeira Angola under Mestre Moraes (b. 1950), a student of the two Joãos under
Mestre Pastinha. Mestre Moraes, a Bahian who spent much of the 1970s in Rio, established the Grupo Capoeira Angola Pelourinho
(GCAP) in Rio in 1980 to emphasize the African roots of Capoeira, and link it to a newfound black political
consciousness movement in Brazil. Mestre Moraes's stylized Capoeira Angola
was informed by years of playing Capoeira Angola
in the tough rodas in Rio, and his teachings differed somewhat from the majority of Bahia's traditionalist
schools (notably, in the teaching of full contact blows, and the use of the lead berimbau in the
center of the musical orchestra instead of the "corner" where most schools place it). When Mestre Moraes invited Mestre João Grande to come out of retirement in the late 1980s, he also appears to have been influenced by these changes.
GCAP and its followers have thus been hugely influential, spreading
their brand of Capoeira Angola worldwide through their
teachings, popular CD recordings, and various offshoot organizations
such as the worldwide FICA established by Mestre Cobrinha Mansa. These organizations, with their aggressive style of play, political leanings, scholarly rhetoric, and self-conscious use of Mestre Pastinha's name and school colors, have also attracted the most attention from cultural academics, in spite of the fact that they represent a clear break from tradition. (The major division in Capoeira Angola remains between the schools of Mestres João Grande, Moraes, and the followers of GCAP/FICA, versus the more diverse traditionalist schools that were brought under the umbrella of the Associação Brasileira de Capoeira Angola, or ABCA, in 1993).
Another notable mestre who
passed through Mestre Pastinha's doors is the mandingueiro
("sorcerer") Mestre Curió, who established his own Escola de Capoeira
Angola Irmões Gêmeos in 1982, and has recently
graduated the first female mestra in Capoeira Angola,
named Mestra Jararaca. Mestre Curió has likewise created a style of Capoeira Angola that stands aside from the overall community, yet is still accepted as part of the tradition.
Given all of this, it might appear that the shadow of Mestre Pastinha, whether he is conjured as a spiritual godfather or merely used to enhance one's pedigree, still dominates
the present-day practice of Capoeira Angola. Indeed, because of his open acceptance of all traditional
Capoeiristas under his roof, few are completely free
from Mestre Pastinha's direct or indirect influence.
Yet, as already noted, today's Capoeira Angola is far from a monolithic practice. Even when setting aside the more visible changes brought about by the GCAP style, traditional Capoeira allows for many individualized stylizations, and includes many forgotten or neglected teachings, such as those of mestres who
have tried to set themselves apart from (or were never linked to) Mestre Pastinha's
teachings. Among this assorted group are Mestre Lua de Bobó,
Mestre Renê, Mestre Neco, Mestre Pelé da Bomba,
Mestre Zé do Lenço, Mestre Raimundo Dias, and
our own Mestre Caboquinho. As also noted earlier, the Associação Brasileira de Capoeira Angola
(ABCA) is a testament to the persistence of the diversity and unity of Capoeira Angola practice, bringing many of these mestres together to ensure the continuation of this diverse heritage of Capoeira
da Bahia. Although it is far from an ideal organization, the ABCA has attempted to continue the work begun by Mestre Pastinha. It has managed to do this by being swayed less by politics and academic rhetoric, and more by the game itself—as Mestre Pastinha would have undoubtedly wanted it.
THE TRIBO AFRO-BAHIANA DE CAPOEIRA
ANGOLA TRADICIONAL
M JOSE DANTAS, T EDFRAN, M CABOQUINHO
(Salvador, Bahia, 2005)
It is in this context that we begin to understand our own place
in the development and continuity of Capoeira.
The path of the T.A.B.C.A.T. organization
under Mestre Caboquinho can be traced back to the teachings of his father, Mestre José
Dantas (d. 2009), who in turn was a student of T.A.B.C.A.T. founder Mestre
João Bodeiro of Serrinha, Brazil in the 1950s. Bodeiro
was himself a student of the little-known Mestre Nonó,
of Mozambique. As was the case with several other mestres of past and present, the elder José Dantas preferred to remain in his own neighborhood and watch over his own students, and as such did not take part in the currents of the wider Capoeira world until near the end of his life.
So while T.A.B.C.A.T., like so many others, owes a great debt to the spirit of Mestre
Pastinha and his followers (and is one of the main reasons
the group has often used Mestre Pastinha's colors of yellow and black), it owes little to his actual teachings. Instead, T.A.B.C.A.T. is part of
the greater, common language of Capoeira da Bahia that
Pastinha and others such as José Dantas worked so hard to continue. As one of few groups dedicated to traditional Capoeira outside
of Bahia, T.A.B.C.A.T. is thus uniquely positioned to give its
non-Brazilian students the deceptively simple keys to the game:
harmony, beauty, and education. 
—Ed Luna (Treinel Fuça Fuça)
Updated
. Please do not quote or cite without author permission.
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