Handbook of Black Studies PDF

Sage Reference Handbook of Black Studies For the most optimal reading experience we recommend using our website. A free-to-view version of this content is available by clicking on this link, which includes an easy-to-navigate-and-sea...

Sage Reference Handbook of Black Studies For the most optimal reading experience we recommend using our website. A free-to-view version of this content is available by clicking on this link, which includes an easy-to-navigate-and-search-entry, and may also include videos, embedded datasets, downloadable datasets, interactive questions, audio content, and downloadable tables and resources. Author: Elisa Larkin Nascimento Pub. Date: 2010 Product: Sage Reference DOI: https://doi.org/10.4135/9781412982696 Disciplines: Race & Ethnicity, Race, Ethnicity & Migration, Black Studies, Sociology Access Date: July 8, 2024 Publisher: SAGE Publications, Inc. City: Thousand Oaks Online ISBN: 9781412982696 © 2010 SAGE Publications, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Sage Sage Reference © 2006 by Sage Publications, Inc. Kilombismo: An African Brazilian Orientation to Afri- cology Elisa LarkinNascimento Kilombismo (kee-lom-bees'-mo) is the first Brazilian expression of Afrocentric theory. It is a proposal of nation building that seeks to rest the political, social, economic, and cultural organization of Brazilian state and so- ciety on the African historical foundations of its heritage. Seen in the works of the major Brazilian intellectual, Abdias do Nascimento (1989, 1991, 1996), the idea of kilombismo has reflected the yearnings of the African Brazilian people to advance their culture and their lives along the basis of cultural and historical events, per- sonalities, and situations in their historical contexts. The word kilombismo comes from the Kimbundu kilombo, translated by Brazilian authors as meaning camp- ground, settlement, village, or capital, as well as army, unity, or union. Historian Beatriz Nascimento (1994) expands the concept to denote the level of political, economic, and cultural organization and, more particular- ly, the shared psychosocial coherence and strength derived from the life force philosophy, which contributed to high levels of resistance against Portuguese invasion and domination of central and southern Africa. These concepts are equally appropriate to African resistance in the Diaspora, where kilombo designates African community built in freedom. The Palmares Republic (1595–1696), led by Zumbi, with its population of more than 30,000, is the most famous example, but kilombos permeated the entire history and territory of colonial and postcolonial Brazil, South and Central America, and the Caribbean. The Palmares Republic was contemporary with, and its resistance paralleled that of, the Angolan people led by Queen N'Zinga, highlight- ing the internationalist and Pan-Africanist dimension of this phenomenon. Contemporary kilombismo maintains that because the African majority population and cultural heritage is the preponderant force in the formation of the Brazilian nation, the democratic principle puts that population and heritage at the center of the nation's culture, polity, and socioeconomic organization. Consistent with Afro- centric thought, kilombismo favors pluralism without hierarchy. Thus, it proposes to strengthen and build the cultural references of indigenous Brazilian as well as African heritage, because both are minimized and dis- torted by the Eurocentric mainstream. As an explicit political theory, kilombismo was articulated by the African Brazilian writer, artist, and activist Abdias Nascimento in the wake of his Pan-Africanist engagement of the 1970s and in the context of the then Handbook of Black Studies Page 2 of 5 Sage Sage Reference © 2006 by Sage Publications, Inc. newly emerging Black political consciousness in South and Central America, expressed in three Congresses of Black Culture in the Americas (Cali, Colombia, 1977; Panama, 1980; São Paulo, Brazil, 1982). Nascimento (1996) characterized Kilombismo's scope as transcending the Brazilian national arena and per- taining to the Americas as a whole. Kilombos are found, with specific characteristics, in every country and area where Africans were enslaved. The word cimarrón, similar to the English maroon, prevails in most of Central America, including Mexico. In Cuba and Colombia, the term is palenque, and in Ecuador and Venezuela, cumbe. All speak to the same phenomenon: African resistance building free communities with economic, political, cultural, and social organization grounded in African precedent. Placing this history of struggle in a continuum with the Haitian revolution, Garveyism, and the Pan-African movement, Nascimento (1989) identifies it as a unique and coherent political strategem. He argues that, with this rich heritage of resistance and renewal, Africans in the Americas have no need to borrow concepts or ideologies from elsewhere. In the 1970s and 80s, this position was particularly cogent for its critique of the Eu- rocentric groundings, not only of capitalism but also of the Marxist ideology prevailing among certain African and African American organizations and governments. As a Pan-Africanist, Nascimento (1996) strongly as- serted the need for independence and neutrality with respect to Cold War disputes among world powers gen- erally oblivious to, and often manipulative of, the interests of African peoples and nations. History, he argued, consistently demonstrates that the issues of racism and colonialism tend to be obscured or ignored by both sides of this ideological dispute, a fact confirmed by his own experience and the experience of Pan-Africanists such as W. E. B. Du Bois and George Padmore. Subservience to either ideological pole should be avoided. Kilombismo points clearly, then, toward the path of nonalignment and South-South dialogue. Assertion of this independent political position individually by nation-states such as India and collectively by the Non-Aligned Movement was crucial to the expansion of world mobilization against apartheid. For Africans in the Americas, kilombismo is the theoretical framework of independent antiracist political move- ments, with the broader goal of organizing their respective nation-states along the lines suggested by the autochthonous history of maroon experience. This goal is all the more appropriate in cases such as Brazil, where African descendants are majority populations. From a theoretical point of view, it is easy to see how the African Brazilians, with such a rich and dramatic history, can find examples for such a broad movement (Pernambuco, 1988). Research on the Kilombo phenomenon suggests that the societies built by Africans in the Americas often were organized along democratic communitarian principles such as those described by Mwalimu Julius Ny- erere (1977) as ujamaa, or African socialism. Taking these principles and traditions as a source of inspiration, Handbook of Black Studies Page 3 of 5 Sage Sage Reference © 2006 by Sage Publications, Inc. Abdias Nascimento (1996, 2002) defined the basic tenets of kilombismo, among which is the major goal of creating “the Quilombist National State, inspired on the model of the Republic of Palmares and of other Kilom- bos” (p. 314) based on a free, just, egalitarian, and sovereign society. The quilombist principle of democratic equality, applied at all levels of power in public and private institutions, extends to gender, social rank, religion, politics, justice, education, culture, race, economic status—indeed, to all expressions of life in society. Em- ployment is a social right and responsibility, and the workers, who produce agricultural and industrial wealth, are the sole owners of the product of their labor. Education and schooling at all levels are gratuitous and open to all without distinction. The history of Africa and African culture, civilization, and arts, have an eminent place in school curricula, as do the history and culture of Brazilian and other indigenous peoples. Creation of an Afro-Brazilian university is a priority. Taking its cue from the profoundly environmentalist philosophy of African religious culture in Brazil, in particu- lar Candomblé, kilombismo's stance is strongly ecological: Essentially a defender of human existence, [it] opposes environmental pollution and favors all forms of environmental improvement that can ensure healthy life for children, women and men, animals, land animals and marine life, plants, forests, rock and stone, and all manifestations of nature. (Nasci- mento, 1991, p. 36) In 1980, at the same time kilombismo was being launched as a political theory, Afro-Brazilian organizations formed a national movement for the reappropriation of the Serra da Barriga, locale of the Palmares Republic. Since then, the quilombist ideal has been expressed in the high level of Black movement mobilization. References Nascimento, A. D. (1989). Brazil: Mixture or massacre?Dover, DE: Majority Press. Nascimento, A. D. (1991). Africans in Brazil: A Pan-African perspective. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press. Nascimento, A. D. (1996). Kilombismo: The African-Brazilian road to socialism. In M. K. Asante & A. S. Abarry (Eds.), African intellectual heritage: A book of sources. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. Nyerere, J. (1977). Ujamaa: Essays on socialism, London: Oxford University Press. Nascimento, A. D. (2002). O kilombismo: Documentos de uma militância Pan-Africana (2nd ed.). Brasília: Handbook of Black Studies Page 4 of 5 Sage Sage Reference © 2006 by Sage Publications, Inc. Fundação Cultural Palmares. Nascimento, B. (1994). O conceito de kilombo e a resistência Negra. In E. L. Nascimento (Ed.), Sankofa: Resgate da cultura Afro-Brasileira (Vol. 1). Rio de Janeiro: SEAFRO, Governo do Estado do Rio de Janeiro. Pernambuco, Waldemar de Moura Lima (1988). Movimento quilombista: Negritude em Ação. Porto Alegre, Brazil. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781412982696 Handbook of Black Studies Page 5 of 5