Capoeira: The History of an Afro-Brazilian Martial Art

e-invention of capoeira Angola. In Bahia other mestres from the old guard continued or resumed teaching
capoeira Angola according to their own conceptions, which could often depart substantially from what
GCAP tried to establish as Angola orthodoxy. Thus mestres such as Boa Gente, Boca Rica, Bobó, Bola
Sete, Curió, João Pequeno, Mário Bom Cabrito, Nô, and Paulo dos Anjos contributed to maintaining the
Angola style in all its complexity in Salvador. Some of their students started teaching capoeira Angola in
other cities of Brazil. M.Jogo de Dentro and Pé de Chumbo, for instance, graduated by João Pequeno,
opened academies in São Paulo. The Associação de Capoeira Angola Navio Negreiro (ACANNE)
established in 1986 and led by M.Renê Bittencourt, a student of M.Paulo dos Anjos, also sought to recover
capoeira Angola and has since established nuclei in various Brazilian states. 99 M.Laercio, Roberval and
Rosalvo, who started training with M.Cobra Mansa and other mestres at the Forte Santo Antônio created the
‘Filhos de Angola’ in 1986. 100 During the 1990s, M.Cobra Mansa and most contra-mestres graduated under
Moraes in Salvador (Boca do Rio, Janja, Paulinha, Poloca, Valmir), left GCAP to set up their own groups
there, in the Southeast or abroad.
Thus, through a variety of channels, capoeira Angola spread again throughout Brazil. The style recovered
its prestige and was discovered and claimed even by groups who initially had no direct affiliation with the
old Bahian angoleiros. As I indicated, Paulista groups such as Cativeiro, who shared at least part of GCAP’s
political agenda, also moved towards the Angola style. In Rio de Janeiro the famous roda in Caxias reverted
almost completely to Angola. Participants originally played the style of Artur Emídio that dominated in the
Northern Zone at the time, but from the 1980s onwards ‘angolized’ their game. Even though its key
organizers such as M.Russo, still claim to play capoeira without any further stylistic qualification, the Caxias
roda is now frequented by a large majority of angoleiros. 101
The Angola style thus gained increasing public space during the 1990s. In 1993 surviving old mestres
united to found the Brazilian Association of Capoeira Angola—ABCA, the first umbrella organization
exclusively for angoleiros. The Bahian government, recognizing the growing importance of the style,
provided subsidies and a colonial townhouse in the historic centre of Salvador. The ABCA has developed a
programme to support old mestres and bring them back into the Angola rodas. 102 M.João Pequeno became
the first president of ABCA, followed by M.Curió and Mala. Just as with mainstream capoeira, however,
the institutionalization of capoeira Angola has also led to the inevitable power struggles within the
organization and disagreements over the policies to adopt.
The growth of capoeira Angola was also encouraged by a group of Afro-centric practitioners and scholars
in the United States, who provided assistance to capoeira in general and GCAP in particular. Supporters
such as Kenneth Dossar and Daniel Dawson organized events and invited mestres from Bahia to attend; this
in return contributed to enhancing the prestige of the latter in Brazil. The first CD recorded by GCAP was
launched by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, in 1996. The ‘First International Encounter’
organized by GCAP in 1994, in Salvador, with participants from the United States and Europe, showed how
international capoeira Angola had already become. The further development of capoeira Angola became
thus closely linked to the growing globalization of the art.
‘Go around the world!’ The globalization of capoeira, 1970s–1990s
IÊ! Let’s go, let’s go, comrade!
IÊ! Go around the world, comrade!
IÊ! The turn that the world makes, comrade!
(Verses sung in capoeira cantos de entrada)
CONTEMPORARY CAPOEIRA 185