Processes of stigmatization of religions of African origin in the city of Campina Grande

The purpose of this project is to study the dynamics of the affirmation of black identity mediated by the house of african-Brazilian cults in the city of Campina Grande, in the interface with the stigmatization process of ethnic and religious.

Choosing as reference point for theoretical interpretive anthropology, which understands society as a network of constantly producing symbols and meanings, we propose to search the yard of Father Walter order to analyze how religion appears as a space for construction and affirmation of black identities in reference to processes of stigmatization related to ethnic and religious field.

   We can say that this construction and affirmation of ethnic identity can also be thought of as a form of political power struggle in order to tell the difference, going beyond a "rescue" the black tradition. This construction reflects the likely creation of a "collective us" (cf. Novaes, 1993), the formation of a group that is mainly interested in claiming a greater social visibility over the erasure that was submitted. This construction of black identity from african-Brazilian religions can be seen as a significant milestone for the construction of identity, appearing in the preface of "Grandma and Grandpa White Nago" (Dantas, 1988), in which Peter Fry presents Candomble as a form of "cultural resistance" that blacks keep their own identity, always in a constant process of construction and affirmation. Thus, this identity can be understood in a collective corpus, given that it can be seen as "cultural resistance", ie the way black people affirm their own identity as opposed to the dominant culture. It is an identity, a collective body that contrasts with the others. Our study aims to examine to what extent we can say that Candomblé still remains a significant form of construction / affirmation of a certain black identity.