The capoeira angola of europeans and bahians players: A transnational community experienced

Abstract

Through ethnographic observation of capoeira angola practicers in Salvador da Bahia, this article attempts to illuminates aspects of sociocultural and economic processes in the circumatlantic web of meanings, implementing the methodology of multi-sited ethnography. The learning together of capoeira skills brings forth tensions connected to ehnicity and unequality between the Bahian and European capoeiristas, mediated by experiences of liberation in the
ritual of roda and reinterpretations of colonial relations. Participation as a form of exchange required in the community is contextualized to material exchange and economy in the
community, revealing capoeira angola’s movements as critical streams in the world economic process. I attempt to demostrate how capoeira angola forms a transnational community, where meanings are constructed in relation to the community’s globalization: the capoeira experience is formed in the coming together of different socio-cultural perspectives in the same capoeira ring.