Curriculum and capoeira

Based on my master's thesis this book discusses the relationship between different knowledges in the school curriculum analyzing a municipal school in Rio de Janeiro where Capoeira workshops were held as part of the Mais Educação Program. I sought to point out possible readings which take into account contemporary demands for identity and difference as well as contributions from social discourse theorizing from Cultural and Post-Colonial Studies and from historiographical anthropological and pedagogical studies on Capoeira. The text reveals that the hegemonic modern/colonial discourse - which sets apart black knowledge and black culture in the curriculum - has not proved to be absolute or without tension. I highlight the protagonism and the anti-racist educational role played by teachers and masters of black cultural traditions. In the school analyzed two black angoleiros capoeiristas Mestre Cláudio and Treinel Ludmila challenge the racism so present in Brazilian education and society and provide to the different subjects in the school opportunities to think the black culture and knowledge under new lenses.