Identidade, memória e narrativas na dança de São Gonçalo do povoado Mussuca (SE)

This study deals with the participation of the dance of São Gonçalo of the Mussuca town/SE, in the process of construction of the ethnic identity among this social group. The Mussuca is a grouping recognized as afro-descendents, linked with black enslaved people in the valley of the Cotinguiba region. The collective memory functions as a drive of this linking with the past and if it makes to elaborate narratives on this descent. The objective of this study was to investigate the ways the rite went through to constitute itself as an element of ethnic representation. Internal and external agents had been identified who had participated in different contexts. By means of an ethnographic work we ve reached some aspects of the local structure social which demonstrated the contradictions through the social relations of the group. This process of ethnic autorecognition presents the kinship and the space question as definers of the social arrangements which establish its ethnic boundaries

Corpos no espelho: um estudo antropológico sobre as construções corporais através das cirurgias plásticas na cidade de Natal

Ce travail est une contribution aux études anthropologiques conduites sur Ia beauté et le corps dans des segments moyens urbains. Il cherche à analyser le processus de construction du corps et sa relation avec le individualisme et Ia beauté et la réalisation de chirurgies plasticiennes esthétiques, à partir d'une approche de la construction sociale. En ce sens, la ligne directrice de cette discussion sont le concept de corps comme une construction sociale et culturelle spécifique de chaque société et les différentes utilisations et les représentations que les divers segments font de celui-ci. A cette fin, une recherche de caractere ethnographique a été réalisé aupres des femmes âgés de vingt à quarante et cinq ans, résidents des quartiers Tirol et Petrópolis de Ia ville de Natal-RN (Brésil), dans Ia période d'avril à novembre 2006. Le travail de terrain a mêlé observation directe et entretiens avec des femmes et des médecins chirurgiens plasticiens

Da cozinha ao terreiro em Mutamba da Caieira (RN) : cotidiano, espaço doméstico e sociabilidade

In this work we thought about the social use of the domestic space and, specifically, the space destined to the preparation of food. The kitchen is a creative space of social relationships. There the families exchange daily interaction with the neighbors, in a collective of the space reserved to the making of food. Our empiric research was in the Mutamba da Caieira community, located in the county of Assu (RN). The data was collected through the etnographic method aided by the photographic resources. In the discussion, we delimitated at the house three types of kitchens: one reserved to the family, another kitchen in the terrace and yet another kitchen in the yard. They are kitchens that link amongst themselves with activities and differentiated temporalities. In the daily social exchange, the kitchen imposes itself as a social space through the conditions that it offers for the production of the foods, the circulation of domestic objects, the communication of knowledge around the cookery, operating a group of symbolic and ritual actions combined with appropriate techniques for the transformation of the foods. The study reveals that the domestic chores accomplished amon relatives and friends form webs of intracommunitary relationships in the use of the three kitchens, and that the social network is updated in a singular moment that usually happens in the community, the Game of Pacará

Os forrós da Serra da Gameleira (São Tomé/RN) : etnicidade, festa e sociabilidade

This work intends to describe and analyze the parties of forró that happen in Serra da Gameleira, in São Tomé/RN. Serra is a divided social space: groups of different ethnic origins live together in Gameleira de Baixo, Salgadinho (or Gameleira de Cima) and Chaves Belas. They are approximately two hundred families that live exclusively from agriculture. We try to understand how the parties inform about the social organization, the ethnic composition of the families that live there and the past of Serra, through the genealogy offorró players. In the discussion, we identify the festive places: in the total, we have Five houses of forró that function regularly one of them has been described. The private and public spaces inside them are intimate related, with no clear limits between the house of forró and the residence. Each house of forró has an owner, that regularly makes the parties, mobilizing a big part of the inhabitants, and provoking the straitening of the social relations. Observing the festive sociability between different social segments, the forró appears like na element that minimizes social conflicts, providing news ways of association and cooperation in the space of Serra da Gameleira. For the collection of facts, we used the ethnographic method, through the direct observation, interviewing and documentary research. The local history is recounted following the routes of oral memory and historical documents analysis. In the end of the analysis, we concluded that music and party are elements that aggregate the different groups that live in the location and determine forms of expression of what is seen as a traditional culture

Tecendo vivências e sentidos do câncer infantil : família, doença e redes de apoio social em Natal-RN

This paper discusses the experiences related to the treatment of children´s cancer which had children, their mothers and families as their main characters. They were mainly originated from areas in the countryside and urban poor areas in the State of Rio Grande do Norte. The non-governmental organization Grupo de Apoio à Criança com Câncer (GACC) was the privileged ethnographic location. In this setting, the mother, which was called acompanhante (companion), and the children, defined as pacientes (patients), were often sheltered in reason of therapeutic practices and the treatment undertaken by children in a nearby hospital. This study aims to focus on the therapeutic itinerary, beyond the children´s suffering, dealing with the family as a whole, since the moral values from these popular families imply the complete involvement of the family in relation to the illness and its treatment. Therefore, it is experienced as a family problem. We also intend to understand the construction of meanings to the illness, dealing with the ideological continuity in the relationships between the families and the GACC. These meanings were built in the intersection of these two spheres, which refer particularly to medical, religious and emotional explanations. Ethnographic methods were applied in this research at the entity and another social contexts, such as the family households. I also tried to retrieve the process of treatment outside the GACC, visiting the family context, when doing dense interviews or just having conversations with informants. It was found that the GACC, as a non-governmental organization, generates a negotiation of identities, which develops, then, through the family as a whole, but also through the child and especially the mother, affecting, in some way, their internal organization. Furthermore, the meanings of the experience of illness appeared to be shaped by the family sphere as well as by the logic of public health structures

Sociabilidades e hedonismos: etnografia entre jovens usuários de substâncias psicoativas sintéticas Fortaleza Ceará

This dissertation shows a comparison between practices related to the body, to identities and to the health of young drug takers of synthetic and manipulated psychoactive substances living in Fortaleza. Through ethnographic accompaniment of parties and two social nets of young people I was able to verify the differences and similarities that make these addicted singular and plural in their notion of ethos and world vision. Notions of being hippie/alternative and being punk are present between these nets. Because their use and circulation are developed in environments usually distinct, it is possible to trace singular aspects between the nets and its actions. In parallel, on the attempt to build a triangulated data, I had information related to youth and drugs in local media and in governmental institutions bound to health mental and city security policies. With this junction of data I present a perspective to questions evolving formal and informal important controls to the conduction of their lives and identities. I present this as a sequel to well developed studies in Brasil about youth in interface to drug use, although still not very explored in the state of Ceará.

Cultura como desenvolvimento entre os Paresi Kozarini

The proposal of the present study is to get to know and to analyze the building up of the culture notion among the participants of the Paresi Kozarini group in the ethnodevelopment context. The main focus is the ethnographic study, presenting a description of Aldeia Rio Verde (Paresi Indigenous Land), understanding it as a synthesis of historic processes which explains the current moment of Paresi Indigenous group. By using the mentioned methodology, the processes and social relations produced along the contact path of this group with regional-national culture were focused, and how that contact affects the present. The research questions which concern the present study refer to the processes of identification of the researched subjects about themselves and in relation to others. According as almost the totality of the indigenous group we usually know as Paresi, recognize itself as Kozarini, the attention is directed to the manner how they see themselves and how they differ from the other Paresi groups, not indigenous people, and other indigenous groups; and which meanings of the prefix ethno- (which culture elements) they have elected to represent and manage external matters to their culture and society, in the context of discussions about ethnodevelopment

Okupar, resistir, insistir : uma etnografia das práticas de ocupação urbana Fortaleza / Ceará

The objective of this dissertation is understand the relationships built between subjects who occupy buildings in a state of abandonment to revitalize them - called okupas, noting which individuals construct such meanings on the practice of occupation and how to organize the construction and maintenance of a collective life project. Having the Okupa Squat Torém, located in the neighborhood of Fatima in the southern city of Fortaleza-CE, as locus and observed through the ethnographic method, followed the social practices of urban segment. I invested in a data collection revealed that the custom of okupas and their domestic habits, inside and outside of okupa, emphasizing the interaction situations, like most appropriate occasions to observe the constant negotiation and refinement of his cunning to intervene in the city . Among the objectives of this research, the main thing is to observe which senses are assigned to the practice of the occupation by okupas. For this, reflecting from the specifics of this urban phenomenon and talking mostly with the tradition of research in the field of anthropology, I tried to address some issues regarding the practice of okupação and organization of the group, which the principles and movements that make these contacts with city etc. The appropriation made by the subjects on the urban space here means understanding them as a cultural expression of a number of collective values, resulting from experience and perception of okupas like themselves. The intention is to show how this practice intervention and collective action has appeared in contemporary times and how my ethnography can contribute to a dialogue on the practices of mobilization and update of the city, considering the Theory of Recognition Axel Honneth (2003) as an analytical category useful to describe the forms of reciprocity experienced by okupas