Contemporary Transformations in the Brazilian Popular Catholic Festivals: the Case of the Holy Divine Spirit Festival (Festa do Divino (original) (raw)
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Journal of historical archaeology & anthropological sciences, 2022
The brotherhoods of the holy ghost and the Azores House 1 The objective of this article is to explore the native cosmology of Azorean immigrants in Rio de Janeiro / Brazil, focusing on some categories that articulate their social, moral and religious relationships between human beings and the Holy Ghost. Our purpose is to describe and analyze these categories and the social and ritual contexts in which they are used, namely the social organization of the brotherhoods and the ritual context of the Holy Ghost Festivals. Let's begin by the brotherhoods. Founded and currently run by immigrants from the Azores, 2 catholic religious brotherhoods worship the holy ghost in various neighborhoods and suburbs of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. There are brotherhoods in Vila Isabel, in Tijuca, Catumbi, Engenho de Dentro 1 This article is a result of field research into the Azorian festivals of the Holy ghost carried out in two national contexts of Azorian immigration: United States (New England) between 1999 and 2000; and Brazil (Rio de Janeiro) between 2001 and 2004; as well as a brief stay in 2004 at Ilha Terceira, one of the nine islands which make up the Azores archipelago and where the festivals of the Holy ghost Holy ghost are especially important. Although our data refers principally to the Brazilian context, we have made use of the data we gathered in the United States and from the Azores. We would like to thank our Azorian friends who, throughout the research, in Brazil, the United States and on Ilha Terceira, received us attentively and with generosity, especially Álvaro and Laura Mendonça; Albino Alves (in memoriam) and Magali; Francisco Rocha (in memoriam) and Lucília; Judite Toste; Liduino and Fátima Areias; Gilberto and Conceição Costa; João Luis (in memoriam) and Alizalda Evangelho; Ramiro and Etelvina; to the directors and members of the Catumbi brotherhood, especially Valter and Suely; Paulinho and Bete; Zeca; Dona Rosa; and to the directors and members of Azores House in Rio de Janeiro. This research received financial support from CNPq, CAPES, FAPERJ and FUJB. 2 In Rio de Janeiro, each brotherhood is organized in a bureaucratic structure, in which the "provider" (or president) has the highest position; followed by the members of the board (social director, treasurer, director of religious matters, etc); and the group of "brothers". discussion of "ethnicity" among Portuguese immigrants, the studies by Feldman-Bianco 3,4 are fundamental. The contributions by the Portuguese anthropologist João Leal 5,6 is especially relevant. Among Azorian intellectuals, Vitorino Nemésio is notable as a formulator of the category of "açorianidade". 7
Bulletin of Latin American Research, 2005
The Festival of the Holy Spirit was considered the most important religious celebration in nineteenth-century Rio de Janeiro. I discuss the popular practices of music, dance and theatre during the festival. By merging European waltz and the African batuque, the heterogeneous public recreated and re-invented a number of new genres that are at the roots of twentieth-century Brazilian popular music. The festival of the Holy Spirit allows an examination of elite strategies and municipal policies regarding popular culture. In this respect, it is remarkable how much political use the Brazilian Empire made of the festival of the Holy Spirit and how its revellers fought for their celebration.
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The Feast of the Divine Holy Spirit and the Sacralization of Spatiality in Manicoré-AM / Brazil
The purpose of this article is to study the spatiality of the Divine Holy Spirit Festival in Manicoré/Amazonas through the symbologies of the festival and the devotees' spatial relationships with the place. In this way, the aim is to understand the affective relationships, the diversity of perceptions gauged and present significant points, addressing the relationship of the subjects in their living space. From a phenomenological perspective based on Relph (1978), the study was carried out through fieldwork and interviews, which formed part of the research methodology. Thus, the Divine Holy Spirit Festival can be understood as more than just a festival, but as resistance to the popular tradition that holds it, a sense of the sacred and of life itself.
Feast and Sin: Catholic Missionaries and Native Celebrations in Early Colonial Brazil
This paper analyzes the struggle of Christian missionaries, notably the Jesuits, against the feasts and alcoholic beverages of the native peoples of colonial Brazil. The missionaries realized that, in the course of these celebrations, the Tupinambá culture, the main impeding force behind evangelization, was renewed and reasserted. It also looks into the main strategies employed by the Europeans to achieve their goal of putting the native feasts to an end as well as propagating the view which privileged temperance and abstinence.
This article discusses the rise of evangelical carnival parades in Rio de Janeiro in relation to spectacular carnival parades that feature Afro‐Brazilian religious elements. The article exposes divergent intersections of religion and cultural heritage in Brazilian carnival. The first intersection aims to affirm the intrinsic connection between samba enredo carnival music and Afro‐Brazilian religion by means of cultural heritage narratives, and the second type employs similar narratives to undo this connection, attempting to make samba enredo accessible to evangelical religious performance. The article demonstrates the important role secularism plays in upholding distinctions between “culture” and “religion,” and shows how evangelical carnival groups engage with such historical formations by means of estratégia (strategy)—evangelical performances in cultural styles that are commonly perceived as “worldly.” This estratégia depends on and proposes a particular set of semiotic ideologies that allows for the separation of cultural form and spiritual content. Efforts to open up “national” cultural styles to different religious groups in light of multicultural politics are laudable, but advocates of such politics should keep in mind that cultural heritage regimes concerning samba push in the opposite direction and support a different set of semiotic ideologies.