Showing posts with label = Missing - Americas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label = Missing - Americas. Show all posts
Brazil - Fandango's Living Museum
Fandango is a popular music and dance expression in coastal communities in southern and south-eastern Brazil. Fandango songs are called modas and are played with handmade instruments – viola, fiddle and frame drum. Traditionally, fandangos were offered as payment for collective activities, such as planting, harvesting and fishing. However, a decline in collective work has led to fandango losing its prestige and sense of identity: many representatives have died and new generations are indifferent to it. Fandango’s Living Museum was conceived to promote safeguarding actions for fandango as an important part of their cultural heritage. The initiative came from a non-governmental organization, Caburé Cultural Association. Approximately 300 local practitioners or fandangueiros have participated to create an open-air community museum and a circuit of visiting and exchanging experience, which includes houses of fandangueiros and musical instrument makers, cultural and research centres, and places for selling local handicrafts. The museum has promoted awareness-raising by organizing local performances, running workshops in partnership with schoolteachers, publishing books and CDs, creating a website, and making bibliographic and audiovisual collections available. The model is based on cooperation, and can be adapted for other cultural expressions and similar regional contexts, taking into account their local characteristics.
Brazil - Call for projects of the National Programme of Intangible Heritage
Each year, a national call for projects from the Programa Nacional de Patrimônio Imaterial encourages and supports safeguarding initiatives and practices proposed by the Brazilian society for the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage. The projects must involve the participation of the community and groups concerned, promote social inclusion and improvement of the life conditions of creators and bearers of such heritage, and respect individual and collective rights. Most projects includes activities such as mapping, inventories and ethnographic research; information systematization and database creation and/or implementation; production or preservation of documentation and ethnographic archives; promotion and transmission of traditional knowledge to new generations; and strengthening communities’ capacities for research, safeguarding and education. Projects can be presented by local government institutions or non-profit private organizations, but must have the prior agreement of the communities involved. The selection process is organized by the Intangible Heritage Department of IPHAN (National Historical and Artistic Heritage Institute) in Brasilia, with projects evaluated by a national committee of specialists. Each project selected receives approximately R$100,000 (US$50,000) and is frequently realized within twelve months. The call for projects aims to strengthen community safeguarding processes and institutions, and to create networks between different institutional and social actors. As such, the process constitutes a model for financing and fostering initiatives of the civil society for safeguarding intangible cultural heritage.
Brazil - Yaokwa, the Enawene Nawe people's ritual for the maintenance of social and cosmic order
The Enawene Nawe people live in the basin of the Juruena River in the southern Amazon rainforest. They perform the Yaokwa ritual every year during the drought period to honour the Yakairiti spirits, thereby ensuring cosmic and social order for the different clans. The ritual links local biodiversity to a complex, symbolic cosmology that connects the different but inseparable domains of society, culture and nature. It is integrated into their everyday activities over the course of seven months during which the clans alternate responsibilities: one group embarks on fishing expeditions throughout the area while another prepares offerings of rock salt, fish and ritual food for the spirits, and performs music and dance. The ritual combines knowledge of agriculture, food processing, handicrafts (costumes, tools and musical instruments) and the construction of houses and fishing dams. Yaokwa and the local biodiversity it celebrates represent an extremely delicate and fragile ecosystem whose continuity depends directly on its conservation. However, both are now seriously threatened by deforestation and invasive practices, including intensive mining and logging, extensive livestock activity, water pollution, degradation of headwaters, unregulated processes of urban settlement, construction of roads, waterways and dams, drainage and diversion of rivers, burning of forests and illegal fishing and trade in wildlife.
Brazil - Frevo, performing arts of the Carnival of Recife
Frevo is a Brazilian artistic expression comprising music and dance, performed mainly during the Carnival of Recife. Its quick frenetic and vigorous rhythm draws upon the fusion of musical genres such as marching music, Brazilian tango, square dance, polka and pieces of classical repertoire, performed by martial bands and fanfares. The music is essentially urban, and like the accompanying dance, ‘Passo’, is vigorous and subversive. The dance stems from the skill and agility of capoeira fighters, who improvise leaps to the electrifying sound of steel orchestras and bands. Practitioners of Frevo and Passo are part of associations, each of which participates in parades for the carnival. Their headquarters provide support for the development, preservation and transmission of knowledge and skills related to Frevo. The element also has a close connection to the beliefs and symbolic universe of the practitioners’ religion. Several associations have colours related to the members’ devotion and various embellishments have religious meanings. Frevo is formed through the creativity and cultural riches that comes from the great mix of music, dance, capoeira and crafts, among others, demonstrating the ingenuity and creative ability of its practitioners. This ability to promote human creativity and respect for cultural diversity is inherent to Frevo.
Brazil - Círio de Nazaré (The Taper of Our Lady of Nazareth) in the city of Belém, Pará
The Círio de Nazaré festival in Belém honours Our Lady of Nazareth. The main procession concludes the festivities on the second Sunday of October, when a wooden image of Our Lady of Nazareth is carried from Sé Cathedral to Sanctuary Square¬¬¬, but the celebrations start in August and run until fifteen days after the procession. Almost the entire city participates and vast numbers of pilgrims travel from across Brazil to attend what is one of the world’s largest religious gatherings. The celebration incorporates numerous cultural elements that reflect Brazil’s multicultural society, including Amazonian culture and cuisine, and crafts such as toys made of local palm wood. The blending of the sacred and the profane gives this event religious, aesthetic, touristic, social and cultural dimensions. Boats play a symbolic role in the procession as Our Lady of Nazareth is the patron saint of sailors. Devotees create small altars in their homes, shops, bars, markets and public institutions. Transmission occurs within families, with small children and teenagers accompanying their parents to the festivities. For many, the Círio is an annual homecoming; for others, it is a space for political demonstrations.
Brazil - Capoeira circle
Capoeira is an Afro-Brazilian cultural practice – simultaneously a fight and a dance – that can be interpreted as a tradition, a sport and even an art form. Capoeira players form a circle at the centre of which two players engage with one another. The movements require great bodily dexterity. The other players around the circle sing, chant, clap and play percussive instruments. Capoeira circles are formed by a group of people of any gender, and comprise a master, counter-master and disciples. The master is the bearer and guardian of the knowledge of the circle, and is expected to teach the repertoire and to maintain the group’s cohesion and its observance to a ritual code. The master usually plays a single string percussion instrument, starts the chants, and leads the game’s timing and rhythm. All participants are expected to know how to make and play the instrument, sing a shared repertoire of chants, improvise songs, know and respect the codes of ethics and conduct, and perform the movements, steps and strikes. The capoeira circle is a place where knowledge and skills are learned by observation and imitation. It also functions as an affirmation of mutual respect between communities, groups and individuals and promotes social integration and the memory of resistance to historical oppression.
Brazil - Cultural Complex of Bumba-meu-boi from Maranhão
The Cultural Complex of Bumba-meu-boi from Maranhão is a ritualistic practice involving forms of musical, choreographic, performing and ludic expression, in which the practitioners’ relationship with the sacred is mediated by the figure of the ox. The practice features certain key distinguishing elements: the cycle of life; the mystical-religious universe; and the ox itself. The practice is heavily charged with symbolism: by reproducing the cycle of birth, life and death, it offers a metaphor for human existence itself. There are similar forms of expression in other Brazilian states, but in Maranhão Bumba-meu-boi is distinguished by the various styles and groups it includes, as well as by the intrinsic relationship between faith, festivities and art. Each year, the Bumba groups from Maranhão reinvent this celebration, creating the songs, comedies, the embroideries on the ox leather and the performers’ costumes. Divided into five main ‘accents’ with particular features, the groups, albeit diverse, share a yearly calendar of performances and festivities. The festival cycle – which reaches its peak at the end of June – may last for four to eight months, involving the following stages: rehearsals; the pre-season; baptisms; public performances or ‘brincadas’; and rituals around the ox’s death. The practice is a period of renovation during which energies are reinvigorated, and is transmitted through children’s groups, dance workshops, and spontaneously within the group.
Bolivia - Peru - Chile - Safeguarding intangible cultural heritage of Aymara communities
The proposed sub-regional project aims at developing safeguarding measures to ensure the viability of the oral expressions, music and traditional knowledge (textile art and agricultural technologies) of the Aymara communities of Bolivia (La Paz-Oruro-Potosí), Chile (Tarapacá-Arica-Parinacota-Antofagasta) and Peru (Tacna-Puno-Moquegua). The activities, planned for implementation over the course of a five-year project, are: (i) identifying and inventorying the traditional knowledge and oral traditions of Aymara communities in the selected areas, (ii) strengthening language as a vehicle for transmission of the intangible cultural heritage through formal and non-formal education, (iii) promoting and disseminating Aymara oral and musical expressions and (iv) reinforcing traditional knowledge related to the production of textile arts and traditional agricultural techniques. These four lines of action of the planned project have been established as priorities by the Aymara communities in the different phases of consultation and preparation of the project and they will be implemented with the full involvement of the communities, guided by the 2003 Convention’s principles. The project intends to adopt as its working strategy the creation of a subregional and international network comprising individuals, communities, groups, cultural managers, specialists, indigenous organizations, research centres, NGOs and Governments, to promote the exchange of experience, information and training in order to strengthen capacities in the region.
Bolivia - Ichapekene Piesta, the biggest festival of San Ignacio de Moxos
Every year, the inhabitants, both young and old, of San Ignacio de Moxos in Bolivia celebrate Ichapekene Piesta, a syncretic festival that reinterprets the Moxeño founder myth of the Jesuit victory of Ignacio de Loyola and melds it with indigenous beliefs and traditions. The festivities begin in May with firework displays, singing and praises, and continue in July with daily and nightly celebrations of masses, funeral wakes, alms-giving and feasts. The main representation of the victory of Saint Ignatius involves twelve sun warriors, wearing spectacular feathers, who battle the guardians of the holy flag – the original ‘owners’ of the forest and water – before converting them finally to Christianity. These rites are an act of faith and constant rebirth, allowing the Moxeños to be reborn into the Christian tradition in the presence of the spirits of their ancestors. The main procession involves 48 groups of participants disguised as masked ancestors and animals, reinforcing the importance of respect for nature. They play tricks and dance to the accompaniment of the Baroque-era music of the Jesuit missions, then around midnight fireworks pop from the top of their wide-brimmed hats, symbolizing the gift of light and vision to live respectfully.
Bolivia - Pujllay and Ayarichi, music and dances of the Yampara culture
Pujllay and Ayarichi are the main musical and choreographic forms of the Yampara culture. They complement each other and form a whole: Pujllay linked to the rainy season and Ayarichi to the dry. Pujllay is performed primarily by males, during the ritual of the same name celebrating the renewal of life and abundance brought on by rains. The sounds, dances and costumes evoke the ‘Tata Pujllay’, a demonic and fruitful entity with boundless energy. A group of musicians play flutes and a horn clarinet. Dancers, lavishly dressed as Tata Pujllay, tirelessly circle around a large altar decorated with food. Ayarichi is danced during festivals dedicated to various Catholic saints who govern the social and cosmic order and influence the preservation of life. The group comprises four male dancer-musicians playing panpipes and drums, and two to four young female dancers. Craftswomen are responsible for weaving costumes meticulously to the smallest detail. Extensive community networks are mobilized to organize the ritual and provide abundant food and drink. Transmission of musical and choreographic knowledge to children occurs without adult participation, often through collective games and observation. Pujllay and Ayarichi create unity among Yampara communities as a favoured way to communicate with nature.
Bolivia - The festival of the Santísima Trinidad del Señor Jesús del Gran Poder in the city of La Paz
The festival of the Santísima Trinidad del Señor Jesús del Gran Poder takes place on the Day of the Holy Trinity in the city of La Paz. The celebration transforms and stimulates the social life of La Paz every year, emanating from a particular way of understanding and living Andean Catholicism. The Parade begins with a procession through the western part of the city. This procession is central to the event, involving 40,000 devotees who dance and sing in an offering to the patron saint. The dance has a sacred significance for the sixty-nine fraternities involved, which are greeted in the streets in a euphoric atmosphere where the music of 7,000 musicians resonates. The heavy dances begin with the Morenos, the iconic dance of the festival, mixed with light dances; meanwhile, the Sikuris and Qhantus native dances hark back to the origins of the Ch’ijini festival. The next day, the procession members solemnly carry the patron saint on their shoulders in the Gran Poder district; devotees pay tribute to the image with incense, flowers and confetti. The fraternities prepare their musical repertoires throughout the year; embroiderers and jewellers transmit their knowledge within the families of the Gran Poder, and the devotional aspect of the practice is transmitted through devotional ceremonies, evenings and processions.
Nicaragua - El Güegüense
A forceful expression of protest against colonial rule, El Güegüense is a satirical drama well known throughout Nicaragua. It is performed during the feast of San Sebastián, patron saint of the city of Diriamba in Nicaragua’s Carazo province. El Güegüense, a synthesis of Spanish and indigenous cultures combining theatre, dance and music, is considered one of Latin America’s most distinctive colonial-era expressions. The earliest texts were probably composed in the early eighteenth century. The story revolves around encounters between the Spanish colonial authorities and native Americans, represented particularly by the central character. A powerful elder figure in pre-Hispanic Nicaragua, El Güegüense, countered charges levelled against him by the colonial officials through a series of clever verbal manoeuvres. Rather than directly confronting or challenging an authority, he attempts to appear consistently cooperative and compliant, while utilizing subterfuge to undermine Spanish authority. Interspersed in street processions, the plays are generally performed by eight main characters supported by dancers. Violins, guitars and drums provide the musical accompaniment. Costumes, wooden masks, hats and other attributes differentiate the various characters. The tradition is familiar to most of Nicaragua’s predominantly Spanish-speaking population owing to the nationwide television coverage of the annual Saint’s Day procession. In fact, it is so well known that Nicaraguans have coined the expression “to put on the Güegüense’s face” to refer to someone who outwardly appears to comply with the rules while working subtly to undermine them. Despite its popularity, El Güegüense is in danger of declining in popularity, and possibly disappearing, due to the country’s difficult economic situation, insufficient support for performers and a diminishing interest among young people.
Dominican Republic - Cultural space of the Brotherhood of the Holy Spirit of the Congos of Villa Mella
The Brotherhood of the Holy Spirit of the Congos of Villa Mella is distinguished in the fields of music, dance and popular festivities. The Brotherhood musicians play instruments called congos. These congos, the origin of which is attributed to the Holy Spirit, are hand-drums. The Brotherhood, which is nowadays open to all without distinction of sex or origin, was founded in the sixteenth century by African slaves and people of mixed origin. For historical reasons, the Brotherhood is an important part of the cultural identity of its members and of the region as a whole. The Festival of the Holy Spirit, celebrated at Pentecost, features prayers, dances and singing, accompanied by the music of the congos and a procession carrying the dove representing the Holy Spirit. This occurs at the wake, during the procession to the cemetery and on the ninth day of mourning, when prayers are recited in front of a three-tiered catafalque carrying a doll representing the dead. At the Banko ceremony, three years after the death, the same catafalque is prepared and the living take leave of the deceased, who then becomes an ancestor. On this occasion, all the guests dance to the music of the congos. The permanence of the Brotherhood has been threatened by the lack of interest shown by the elite in cultures of African and mixed origin. Today, the acceleration of urban growth, migration, unemployment and the standardization of values is reinforcing prejudices and the lack of understanding of the Brotherhood.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)