Ethnic emergence processes and identity reaffirmation strategies: the meanings of the indigenous Games and the Pataxó bodyEthnic emergence processes and identity reaffirmation strategies: the meanings of the indigenous Games and the Pataxó body in Coroa Vermelha-BA
Pataxó Indigenous Games. Strategies. Resistors. Retake.
The present work discusses the practices of the body culture of movement, presented in the Pataxó Indigenous Games (JIP), specifically in the Indigenous Territory of Coroa Vermelha - Bahia. Its purpose is to reflect on the ethnic and identity processes, which are crossed by the perspective of culture and its production of multiple meanings present in social practice. Therefore, this study sought to demonstrate how the Pataxó build their games by recreating their ethnic identity (and vice versa), as well as describe how they develop and appropriate various strategies that imply the strengthening of resistance movements to retake, among other things, things, their territories and their stories. The study was conducted along three axes: in the first, issues related to education and indigenous schools are addressed; then, the meanings of the games are analyzed; and, finally, a reflection is made on the symbolic representations of the body that are remembered during the JIPs. The methodological process of this research is based on oral history, being carried out through the collection of interviews and the elaboration of a field diary. In addition, this study was developed based on bibliographic research, that is, investigating the theoretical material on the chosen theme through the recognition of the delimiting problem of the study. Therefore, this is a qualitative and descriptive research. As results achieved, we can characterize the JIPs as some of the strategies developed (among many others that exist) within the school that contribute to the resistance movements for the retaking of the lands and memories of the Pataxó people. Furthermore, the Games also reflect the process of symbolic representations of the body, elucidating the marks left by historical processes and territorial dynamics that had as consequences, among others, genocide, ethnocide, loss of territory and historical and social oblivion, to which the Pataxó were subjected more than 500 years ago in Brazil. Thus, it is possible to understand the JIPs as a sociocultural manifestation that marks a new moment in Pataxó history.