Matthias Röhrig Assunção

Research interests

Capoeira. Combat games and martial arts in the ‘Black Atlantic’

For many people the resistance against slavery is best expressed in the combat game capoeira. African and Creole slaves in Brazilian port cities such as Recife, Salvador and Rio de Janeiro developed it to a complex martial art, which combined percussive music, singing, dance and fight. Capoeira. The History of an Afro-Brazilian Martial Art

Articles to download:

• ‘The Challenges Capoeira Faces Today’/‘Os desafios contemporâneos da capoeira’/’Los desafíos contemporáneos de la capoeira’ (with Luiz Renato Vieira). Textos do Brasil, no. 14:9-19. Brazil, Ministry of Foreign Relations. Brasil, Ministério das Relações Exteriores. Editions in English/Portuguese/Spanish.
• ‘Mitos, controvérsias e fatos. Construindo a história da capoeira’. (Português, com Luis Renato Vieira)
• ‘Juegos de Palo in Lara. Elementos para la história social de un arte marcial venezolano’. (Spanish, pdf
• 'Capoeira. Zur Geschichte einer afro-brasilianischen Kunstform zwischen Anpassung und Widerstand', In Aneignung und Selbstbehauptung in der Geschichte der Europäischen Expansion, ed. D.Rothermund, (German, pdf).
• ‘A danca da zebra’. Revista de História da Biblioteca Nacional, Rio de Janeiro: 30 (Março/March): 14-21. With Cinésio Feliciano Peçanha (Mestre Cobra Mansa).

Recommended capoeira websites:

Here are some websites that contain useful information on capoeira and its history:

• Portal Capoeira
• Capoeira Palmares/Paris
• International Capoeira Angola Foundation

Selected capoeira groups in London:

• East London Capoeira
• Kabula
• Marazul

Other research interests:

• History of slavery and post-emancipation societies
• Agrarian and peasant history
• Political history of nineteenth and twentieth century Brazil
• Latin American popular culture
  

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