As memórias, narrativas e recriações que entretecem a rede jongueira e caxambuzeira no Sudeste do Brasil

Abstract

The practices of jongos and caxambus by social agents from communities located on the interstate borders between the South of Espírito Santo, North and Northwest of Rio de Janeiro and Southeast of Minas Gerais, in addition to being valuable knowledge of the symbolic and spiritual dimension of their territories, represent mobilizations regarding territorial demarcation and ethnic identity as Afro-Brazilians and quilombolas for access to constitutional rights. In addition to these categories of self-identification, they also stand out jongueiros or caxambuzeiros, due to the cultural heritage recognized in 2005 as “Jongo do Sudeste” by IPHAN. Social relations, especially with the aforementioned state culture agency, which involve ethnic agents led by “masters” (these elders who form and organize the “group”, a collective that promotes rituals in accordance with inherited memories and narratives for this leadership), are the object of study of this doctoral research. In this context, I highlight the articulations established by the Jongo Congola Group, from Campos dos Goytacazes (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), especially the actions carried out by master Geneci Maria da Penha, Dona Noinha. Between 2012 and 2016, I participated in research on the topic in several communities that practice this expressive modality in the state of Espírito Santo. However, from 2017 onwards, I extended the analyzes to the other regions of the Southeast and, in particular, to the municipality of Campo dos Goytacazes, at which time I was able to observe the cultural dynamics in the “terreiro de Noinha”, based on the actions of the Jongo Group Congola. This extension was based on the reports of places of memory given by the “masters”, during that first moment of immersion in the world of jongo and caxambu in the years 2012 to 2016, in which they highlighted in the interviews the narratives of their ancestors’ displacements (africans and afro-brazilians who were enslaved on coffee and sugar cane farms), and from places where these practices took place in the past. Ethnographic data is captured through interviews, audiovisual and photographic records, in addition to materials available in the jongueiros personal documentary collection. Jongo is a recreation resulting from the organizational processes of the social agents practicing this ritual, which gives it a constant and changing reconstruction of its territorialities, established by the narratives of its ancestors, by past festivals that promoted rituals, music (“pontos”) sung and affinity of common origin from the African continent. Furthermore, all these elements permeate the speeches of these social agents to undermine the memories and places of their respective municipalities as well as the re-africanization of their territories and their aesthetics.