The Anthropology of Brazil

optional courses

Classroom

In this course, the students will learn about the anthropology of Brazil. The course centers on the representative areas of Brazilian studies like cultural identity, the ethnography of the Amazon, carnival, ritual practices, anthropology of poverty, violence, religion, and art.

The course gives students a general introduction to the anthropology of Brazil. It centers briefly on its history and its conformation as a multiethnic Nation, with an African, indigenous, European, and Latin American cultural heritage. It also provides students with ethnographic knowledge of the anthropology developed in this country and its impact worldwide.

DaMatta. 1991. Carnivals, Rogues, and Heroes: An Interpretation of the Brazilian Dilemma. Notre Dame and London: University of Notre Dame Press. Chapter 4. “Do you know who you’re talking to?!”. The Distinction between Individual and Person in Brazil. Pp. 137-197.

Fryer, Peter. 2000. Rhythms of Resistance: African Musical Heritage in Brazil. London: Pluto Press. Chapter 6. The African Dance Heritage. Pp. 86-108.

González Varela, Sergio. 2017. Power in Practice: The Pragmatic Anthropology of Afro-Brazilian Capoeira. New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books.

Johnson, Paul Christopher. 2002. Secrets, Gossip, and Gods. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Kulick, Don. 2009. “Soccer, Sex, and Scandal in Brazil”, Anthropology Now, Vol. 1 (3): 32-42.

Lévi-Strauss. 1961. Tristes Tropiques. Translated by John Russell. New York: Criterion Books. Part 3. The New World, Chapter 9 Guanabara, Chapter 10 Into the Tropics, and Chapter 11, São Paulo. Pp. 85-111.

Mayblin, Maya, 2010. Gender, Catholicism, and Morality in Brazil. Virtuous Husband, Powerful Wives. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Nascimento, Elisa Larkin. 2003. The Sorcery of Color: Identity, Race, and Gender in Brazil. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. Chapter 2. “Brazil and the Making of Virtual Whiteness”. Pp. 42-74.

Pardue, Derek. 2008. Ideologies of Marginality in Brazilian Hip Hop. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Robb Larkins, Erika. 2015. The Spectacular Favela: Violence in Modern Brazil. California: University of California Press. Introduction. Pp. 1-27.

Vilaça, Aparecida. 2005. “Chronically Unstable Bodies: Reflections on Amazonian Corporalities”, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, (ns), 11, 445-464.

Viveiros de Castro, Eduardo. 1992. From the Enemy’s Point of View: Humanity and Divinity in an Amazonian Society. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Chapter 1. Cosmology and Society. Pp. 1-30.

Viveiros de Castro, Eduardo. 1998. “Cosmological Deixis and Amerindian Perspectivism”, The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 4 (3): 469-488.

Viveiros de Castro, Eduardo. 2014. Cannibal Metaphysics: For a Post-Structural Anthropology. Minneapolis: Univocal.

Viveiros de Castro, Eduardo. The Relative Native: Essays on Indigenous Conceptual Worlds. Afterword by Roy Wagner. Chicago: HAU Books and The University of Chicago Press,

2015.

At the end of the course, students will learn about the importance of Brazilian culture in the world and the anthropology developed in this country. They will identify the extent of topics in Brazilian anthropology, particularly those related to race, music, gender, violence, identity and indigenous cultures.

A final exam about one of the course topics, with a value of 80%. Participation in class and exposition of a relevant theme: 20% Attendance is mandatory.