Brazilin Generational Cultures: A Quilombola and Hip Hop Dance-Film

Using participatory film practices Northern Irish researchers/filmmakers will collaborate with two Afro-Brazilian community organisations, Força Gueto and ATEQUILA, to co-produce a ‘dance-off’ film that explores the different but connected cultures of Amazonian Quilombola and urban Hip-Hop in Maranhão state. Quilombolas are descendants of slaves who escaped to live in the Amazon forest. Hundreds of Quilombola communities still exist relatively self-sufficiently but are threatened by violent expansion of extractivist industries. Força Gueto is an association of Hip Hop artists from the periphery favelas of São Luís, communities marked by impoverishment, acute violence, and structural racism. Through Hip Hop, Força Gueto celebrates diversity and fosters shared creativity through dance, music, and visual arts. The group is multiracial without distinction of gender, religion, age, sexuality or physical appearance. ATEQUIILA, a Quilombola collective founded in 2007, is the legal representative of the 155 Quilombola communities in the Quilombola Ethnic Territory of Alcântara. In addition to community and cultural activities, ATEQUILA manages the Quilombolas’ collective title to their territory, which parallels the titles to territories of Indigenous peoples. Brazil’s Quilombola communities practice an Afro-Amazonian art form, Tambor de Criola, centred on collective ceremonial dance and music and passed down from their escaped slave ancestors evolving over time through the interpretations of each generation of artists. Hip Hop is primarily an urban phenomenon, which is also inspired by African dancing and song and developed as a socio-political art form representing freedom, growth and learning. Hip Hop and Quilombola communities share the cultural heritage of being descendants of slavery, colonialism, and contemporary forms of social, economic and political racism, and share a cultural connection, rooted in the common heritage of their art in African rhythms, instruments, singing and shamanism. It is rare for these communities, separated as they are by distance and life-style, to share their related but separate heritages. Our project will use documentary film to represent the ways that descendants of slavery in Brazil utilise the cultural forms of dance, music and song to address the legacies of slavery and colonialism, in the contemporary contexts of rural de-forestation and urban marginalisation. Our aim is to create a dance-film that embodies the resilience and resistance culture fostered by the dances and songs of both communities. Both Hip Hop and Quilombola dance and music cultures are means of fostering community solidarity and protecting each other from the impact of racial weathering. Dance and music can convey stories viscerally and communicate on an emotional and embodied level. This will be the first occasion for the sharing, comparing and learning from these different but related experiences. Through the use of participatory practices we will create a process and output that bring together artists from both communities to collaborate to produce a film - which will premiere at a cultural event with live performances - that reflects their shared values, their joy in their art and that may foster solidarity in their fight for their futures. Distribution of the film locally, nationally and internationally will benefit the Hip Hop and Quilombola communities throughout Brazil and also of be of interest to international communities with similar experiences of colonial and slavery histories. Academics in the fields of culture, film, dance, music, colonial, Black, environment, anthropology, and Latin American studies will also find the film’s revelations insightful for their inter-disciplinary studies.