Razor, prejudice and rehabilitation of capoeira

Abstract

At the beginning of the twentieth century, in Rio de Janeiro, there was a great mobilization to methodize and make capoeira the national sport. Thus, we sought to make a contrast between this regulated capoeira, the Gymnastica Nacional, and the street capoeira, the capoeira carioca. For this, some researchers of the history of capoeira in Rio de Janeiro were read, then, comparing the two manuals of the Gymnastica Nacional, the Capoeira Guide and the Gymnastica Nacional, and several newspaper and magazine articles seeking to understand the discourse brought, corroborated with what some researchers had already pointed out. In this way, going a little further than what has already been said, it was realized that the Gymnastica Nacional excluded many of the elements of traditional capoeira carioca in an attempt to escape racism.