Focus and Scope Cadernos de Campo - journal of social anthropology - is a semiannual publication dedicated to disseminating essays and research papers on topics of interest to the contemporary anthropological debate. It may contribute to the research at the graduate level, both at home and abroad. The journal periodically accepts contributions in the following formats: articles and unpublished essays, translations, reviews, interviews and aesthetic productions. Created in 1991, Cadernos de Campo is the result of the continued efforts of students and of the postgraduate program in Social Anthropology of the University of São Paulo in the quest to produce a magazine of quality and relevance for academic debate. With the original objective of disseminating the production of the student body of the Postgraduate Program in Social Anthropology of the University of São Paulo (PPGAS / USP), the journal has become, during those years, an important national and international journal. Cadernos de Campo has its metadata indexed in the following national and international databases: CAPES Journals | CLASE | Latindex | Sumários.org | Ulrich’s | Ibict-SEER Quick access: Register| Submission| Editorial Team| Current Issue| Archives - All Issues
Universidade de São Paulo. Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas
I authorize Cadernos de Campo Journal of Anthropology to publish the work of my authorship/responsibility, as well as I take responsibility for the use of images, if accepted for publication. I agree with this statement as an absolute expression of truth. On my behalf and on behalf of eventual co-authors I also take full responsibility for the material presented. I attest to the unpublished nature of the work submitted
Culture and freedom in the thought of Frans Boas: towards an Anthropology of Education
Review of the book Antropologia da Educação, by Franz Boas (2022).
Copyright (c) 2025 Cadernos de Campo (São Paulo, 1991) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
"Body and History: temporal displacements in perspective in anthropological translation."
This essay aims to present some of the central points in the work of authors such as Marylin Strathern, Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, and Manuela Carneiro da Cunha, especially concerning their critiques of the problem of “interpretation” in anthropological translation. Here, I guide the discussion around terms like “body,” “time,” and “history,” as these are at the heart of an important debate regarding the limits of the epistemological foundations of anthropology—and of Euro-Western thought, more generally—serving as a compass to guide the reader through the thinking of these authors and, possibly, leading us to new theoretical horizons. Thus, the article serves both as an introductory exposition of some of the reflections of fundamental authors in Anthropology and as an effort to reiterate the essential place that the “body” occupies in the production of anthropological knowledge today
On the restitution of African artifacts preserved in Western museums
Translation of the text "À propos de la restitution des artefacts africains conservés dans les musées d’Occident", resulting from the acceptance speech for the 2018 Gerda Henkel Prize that was delivered to Achille Mbembe on October 8, 2018 in Düsseldorf, Germany. Originally published in Analyze Opinion Critique (AOC) magazine on October 5, 2018.
Art and Science Worlds in Times of Ecological Urgency
This dossier on Art and Science Worlds in Times of Ecological Urgency seeks to shed light on the generativity of contemporary co-creations established between artists and scientists. Through very diverse paths, methods, and collaborative relationships, the visual essays gathered in the dossier present creative processes that mobilize photography, sculpture, performance, collage, drawing, and embroidery, raising crucial questions about a series of issues such as multi-species relationships, the colonial logics and dynamics that constitute the ecological crisis, the ethical problems and responsibilities involved in research relationships, the situated instances of the notion of collaboration, among many others. In general, all the works point to the need to elaborate alternative stories and to the centrality of interdisciplinarity in the face of the multiple and multifaceted problems posed by the ecological crisis.
Special Issue Quimeras: Art and Science worlds in times of ecological urgency
This editorial essay proposes friction as an analytical key to read volume 34 of Cadernos de Campo and, at the same time, to reflect on contemporary anthropology. Rather than identifying a thematic or methodological unity among articles, dossiers, reviews, and the translated text, the authors highlight a shared sensibility oriented toward zones of tension: asymmetrical encounters, faltering categories, resistant materialities, dissonant temporalities, and epistemological and political disputes. By engaging contributions that address environmental catastrophes, unequal mobilities, forensic anthropology, Indigenous, quilombola and Afro-diasporic worlds, art and science, education, gender, colonialism, and contested collections, the essay shows how epistemologies in friction refuse premature stabilization and sustain the tense coexistence of heterogeneous worlds. Thus, the volume is presented as an expression of an implicated, critical, and self-reflective anthropology that takes the world’s frictions as privileged sites of observation, responsibility, and the invention of new relations.
Afro-Brazilian Cultural Heritage Network: Challenges and Potential of Collections
Presentation text for the dossier "Afro-Brazilian Archives in Network: Actions in Perspective". The text highlights that networking is a historical and existential practice for the Afro-Brazilian population, serving as a continuous strategy of resistance against colonial violence and the erasure of memory. This movement manifests itself in the recent creation of the Afro-Brazilian Archives Network, which seeks to map, gather, and value initiatives, such as quilombos (maroon communities) and terreiros (Afro-Brazilian religious centers), that construct counter-narratives and challenge institutionalized racism in museums and archives. The works that make up the dossier demonstrate the vitality of these collective actions in different territories and languages, defending the preservation of Black memory as a crucial technology for survival and a path to a reparative future.
Dossier on Afro-Brazilian Archives in Network: actions in perspective.
The Network of Afro-Brazilian Archives: Highlights of early experiences
This article presents a brief overview of the creation and activities of the Afro-Brazilian Archives Network between October 2022 and June 2025. The Network, proposed and coordinated by the Afro-Brazilian Museum Association, a Social Organization of Culture that manages the Emanoel Araujo Afro-Brazilian Museum, in partnership with the Secretariat of Culture, Economy and Creative Industries of the State of São Paulo, currently brings together forty-six museological, cultural, or memory initiatives from twelve states that safeguard tangible and intangible cultural assets produced or recognized by Black people or communities to reference the artistic, cultural, and historical achievements of the Black population in Brazil. Currently under development, the Afro-Brazilian Archives Network promotes partnerships, publicizes the mapping of related initiatives it undertakes, holds virtual meetings, and organizes annual in-person gatherings.
museologia; redes temáticas; memória negra; acervos afro-brasileiros
We are researchers working in science, arts and ethics. Cracks in ceramics, in disciplines, in binaries are the point of departure for our project: Bactohealing. It draws on ‘kintsugi’, the Japanese technique to fix ceramics with gold. Bactohealing proposes to mend cracks with the help of microorganisms: bacteria and fungi grow a solid bond that mimics ‘scar tissue’ over the fracture. Simultaneously we open an inquiry around the ethics of synthetic biology.
biotechnology, environmental ethics, bioarts, speculative writing
Musicking identities in a Caribbean archipelago
Review of the book Paraíso y frontera: Prácticas musicales y perfomance de la etnicidad en la isla de San Andrés (2020), de Dario Ranocchiari.
HUMANITY IN FRAGMENTS: HUMANITY IN FRAGMENTS: REFLECTIONS ON THE PRACTICE OF FORENSIC ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE DECOSIFICATION OF THE HUMAN BODY
This article examines the role of Forensic Anthropology and Archaeology in the identification of human remains and the restoration of dignity to the individuals represented by these vestiges. It addresses the concept of the "de-objectification" of bones, which critiques the bureaucratic and scientific tendency to reduce cadavers to mere objects, disregarding their biography and identity. The research is based on a literature review, analysis of emblematic cases, and an interview with a specialist in the field. Ethical, legal, and social challenges in forensic practice are explored, particularly in contexts of violence and enforced disappearance. The study highlights the importance of interdisciplinarity between forensic sciences and social sciences to ensure a humane approach to human remains. It concludes that Forensic Anthropology goes beyond technical identification, contributing to the reconstruction of the history and memory of victims, reinforcing respect for human rights.
Preserving Black memory is a survival technology: notes on the educational activities of the Afro-Brazil-South Museum through NEABI/Unesc in the Far South of Santa Catarina
This article aims to analyze the preservation of Black and Indigenous memory in the extreme south of Santa Catarina through the actions of the Afro-Brasil-Sul Museum (MABSul) and the Center for Afro-Brazilian and Indigenous Studies (NEABI/Unesc). The research investigates the lack of representation of these populations in traditional memory spaces and discusses inclusive alternatives. Projects such as the Ethnological Tree and Sankofa Memory Game were analyzed, as they rescue and value ancestral knowledge. The results indicate that these initiatives contribute to strengthening cultural identity, democratizing knowledge, and combating epistemicide. The study concludes that expanding these actions is essential to promoting racial equity and incorporating Afro-Brazilian and Indigenous narratives into school curricula and institutional spaces.
Afro-Brazilian Collections in Network: Actions in Perspective
Dreaming Matter: Pina and AI as an Oracle of Forms and Absences
This essay discusses the complexity of authorship and agency in collaborative processes between humans and generative systems, drawing on the contributions of computer science theorists such as Lucia Santaella and Yuk Hui regarding the ambiguity between autonomy and automatism in the cybernetic universe. Based on these articulations, I present as a case study and backbone of the article the artistic series Πίνα (Pina), analyzed as a poetic unfolding of these issues. The objects from this body of work challenge certain boundaries between reproduction and innovation, emphasizing the role of AIs not only as a tool, but also as a partner that, even unintentionally, exposes some of the structures that shape an artistic production process, highlighting both the power and the limitations of generative systems in creative action.
Meanings of work according to the Terena
Indigenous “workers”, “industrious”, “hardworking”: these were some of the stereotypes from which the Terena were characterized by colonial chronicles, scientific writings, and common sense discourses of non-indigenous people. This article aims to discuss this type of characterization by confronting it with some of the meanings the Terena workers themselves attribute to the category and experiences of “work”. I will argue that such experiences should be interpreted less through the lens of assimilatory integration and more through the lens of openness to the other — a principle that best expresses the Terena people’s effort to skillfully balance the work carried out within and outside the villages.
Heart of Darkness, a dense description of Belgian colonialism
Review of Conrad, Joseph. 2021. Heart of Darkness. Translated by Paulo Raviere. Rio de Janeiro: DarkSide Publishing. 175pp.
Glaciers - Transcending Disciplinary Borders in Artistic Research
This visual essay explores glaciers as sites of interdisciplinary inquiry, blending artistic research and scientific study to illuminate their materiality, history, and the impact of climate change. Centered on the Schlatenkees glacier in Tyrol, Austria, the project draws on fieldwork and the study Evolution of debris cover on glaciers of the Eastern Alps, Austria, between 1996 and 2015 (Fleischer et al., 2021). It examines glacial retreat through sensory and creative methods, producing artistic outputs such as zines, collages, and experimental audio recordings. These artistic outputs juxtapose scientific findings with emotional and symbolic narratives, reimagining glaciers as more-than-human entities and repositories of cultural memory. The essay situates glaciers within global ecological crises, highlighting their dual roles as fragile ecosystems and metaphors for collective grief and transformation. By bridging data with storytelling, the project fosters a deeper understanding of the interconnectedness of glacial changes and human action, urging collective responsibility for preserving these vital natural archives.
Anthropology; Ethnography; Anthropology of Emotions
Creation or imitation? An essay on primatological experiments with chimpanzees, capuchin monkeys, human children... and scientists
This essay in the anthropology of science explores conceptions of imitation in non-human primates through an analysis of ten publications from 1990 to 2005, inspired by the provocative question: “Do monkeys ape?”. Most of the articles are literature reviews in primatology, assessing whether monkeys, chimpanzees, and human children possess the capacity to imitate. By examining the psychological experiments conducted in these studies, I aim to shed new light and shadows on the debate, highlighting how key categories of Western thought – such as subject and object, action and consequence, culture and nature – are embedded in these primatological investigations.
The collective museum practices of the Museu das Favelas and the exhibition “About Experiences”
The text shares the process of constructing the collaborative curation of the long-term exhibition “About Experiences”, especially the selection of museum objects to compose the nascent Favela Museum’s Collection. Based on the premise of bringing different perspectives on the favelas, without romanticization or stereotypes, the institution's museum work is established on basic community principles. Therefore, the application of the theory about the social function of the museum must be reflected in its museum work, which must be collaborative, decolonial and resilient. In the case of the Museu das Favelas, a museum that has been in existence for a little over two years, museum work is interpreted in a broader way, appropriating and being appropriated by its social role. In this way, decolonizing museological practices go against the discourses from the beginning.
When death is only the beginning: reports from a forensic anthropologist
Review of the book "Written in Bone" by Sue Black (2021).
For a Black and Feminist Memory of Brazilian Activism: The Case of the Sueli Carneiro Archive
The article presents the processes of creation and organization of the Sueli Carneiro Collection as a symbolic case of the preservation of Black memory in Brazil. The Casa Sueli Carneiro, an institution dedicated to the legacy of the philosopher and activist, has developed an innovative archiving process that combines the training of Black professionals, digitization, and public access. The text highlights, in its first and second sections, the specific features of the collection, which brings together personal documents, records of the Black and feminist movements, as well as Sueli Carneiro's intellectual production. Later, in the third section, we discuss the importance of personal collections and community archives in building counter-hegemonic historical narratives, and the need for specific public policies for their maintenance and dissemination. Finally, we argue that Black memory should be understood as collective heritage, and that promoting support mechanisms for its preservation is a fundamental step in rebalancing historical narratives and strengthen democracy and Human Rights.
With the windowpanes of the installation Roaring Winds we present our transdisciplinary approach to the analysis of the psychodynamic concept of projection as situated affective regulation (Habets et al 2024). Working on the crossroads of ecological psychology, visual arts, philosophy we draw on textual analysis of self-narrations in historic sources, phenomenological interviews, and the making and registration of art installations, to make salient and tangible the kinds of projective skills people have developed in relation to their living environment.
Review of the book Who's Afraid of Gender? (2024) by Judith Butler .
Anthropocene/Plantationocene and the pesticide rain
This essay discusses the relationship between Plantations and climate change, with main emphasis on the consequences caused by pesticides. The Anthropocene/Plantationocene refer to the time when geological changes occurred on a planetary scale. It is argued that these mutations are related to Colonialism – established in the late 15th and early 16th centuries – which caused genocides, ecocides and epistemicides. The colonizing violence instituted the Plantations, which produced the privatization of land/territories and the control of bodies. With the advance of colonial extraction of forests, minerals and monocultures, the Earth's socio-biodiversity was enormously reduced. After the Second World War, chemical and biological control expanded in scale and speed, in addition to the use of machinery based on fossil fuels in agriculture. In contrast, it is possible to identify forms of (r)existences that build resurgences in the face of climate change, through multispecies socialities and through practices and knowledge linked to other agricultures.
Shards of a body that writes about the weight of the world: possible readings of Shattered Writing, by Mina Loy
Review of the book Shattered Writting – feminist manifesto, notes on existence and other writings (2020), by Mina Loy
Questioning Environmental Racism among Ruins and More-than-human Landscapes in Goiabal Park
We present a photographic essay carried out among the ruins of the Parque do Goiabal, one of the last remaining fragments of the Cerrado biome in the city of Ituiutaba, Minas Gerais, Brazil. Drawing on feminist and decolonial debates fostered within an undergraduate degree program in Biological Sciences, we invested in the convergence of artistic, scientific, and popular knowledge. Through performance, photography, and text, we seek to denounce environmental racism and its racist and colonial mechanisms tied to the ecological crisis, while also envisioning possible paths forward in more-than-human landscapes. With these concerns in mind, the main objective of the essay is to mobilize unruly, resistant, and creative practices that open fissures in the colonial, racist, and genocidal structures that affect both human and non-human lives.
Science Education; Confluence; Landscapes in Ruins; Anthropocene; Environmental Racism.
Black brazilian guitar: the contributions of black guitarists to the formation of Brazilian culture.
This article explores the trajectory of the Black guitar in Brazil, highlighting its influence on the formation of Brazilian popular music. The study identifies how the guitar became a central instrument in the expression of Afro-Brazilian culture, showcasing the contribution of Black musicians in shaping a unique Brazilian musical identity. Additionally, the article discusses the role of the guitar as a tool for resistance and cultural affirmation, emphasizing the importance of recognizing and valuing the legacy of Black artists in the history of music in Brazil.
Being a citizen and having citizenship: preliminary reflections on an analytical category
During ethnographic research dedicated to naming and bureaucracy in Brazilian registry offices, the categories ‘citizen’ and ‘citizenship’ were used by interlocutors to explain the necessity—and obligation—of producing and keeping documents. Here, analysing scenes from the 1st National Civil Registry Week, I point to the existence of a “state notion of Person” – the “citizen” – which would emerge, above all, from the ways in which registry office agents and the judiciary mobilise and attribute meanings to such categories. Those who sought documentation inhabited, from the perspective of state agents, a liminal space between being and not being a citizen. Thus, I propose that there would be (1) a mode of management in which only through the production and safekeeping of a birth certificate would it be possible to “be” a citizen, and (2) a mode of organisation of the state, its institutions and agents, in which the emergence of “citizenship” would open up the possibility of accessing public services, social programmes, political rights, etc.
Santos Collection: Afro-Brazilian diversity in Umbanda and Candomblé records
The orality of the terreiro peoples is a principle that generates energy, strength, and spiritual connection. Axé, the cosmological element of the Yoruba peoples, symbolizes vital energy and the power of the word. In the rites of the povo de santo, the drumming and chants are present: the Orins (Candomblé) or Curimbas (the points of Umbanda). From the 1930s onwards, some of these oral traditions were recorded on discs, creating new dynamics between the terreiros and society, influencing culture, the social environment, and power relations. The "Acervo dos Santos" arose from the investigation, analysis, and preservation of the music of Brazilian terreiros present in phonograms in Long Play format and is part of the Brazilian Afro-Archives Network. The records of these terreiros are cultural artifacts of education, endowed with representativeness, historicity, and memory, underpinning current educational practices and, potentially, Education for Ethnic-Racial Relations/ERER.
Chemical Stories: Making Visible the Invisible
Anthropogenic chemicals compose the material elements through which societies structure themselves. These substances often hold complex, untold stories—yet the spaces for narrating them are lacking. This short visual essay explores how we might engage with such stories, situating the work within molecular politics: a broader framework that recognises chemicals as historical and political actors. The essay proposes and develops the notion of critical visibility, a design approach informed by media theory and speculative design, which challenges dominant narratives surrounding chemicals. The concept is explored through an experimental redesign of the Billie Cup—a reusable cup found across Dutch university campuses. Through this case study, the essay argues that making chemical stories visible is crucial for new and alternative material imaginaries.
Being at home and Being a visitor: notes on ways of being, moving and receiving from/in the Malhadinha Quilombola Community
The objective of this article is to show the dynamics of receptivity, based on the compositions and decompositions that the categories of being at home and being a visitor present in the Malhadinha Quilombola Community, located in Tocantins. Based on the mobility of these categories, derived from the art of welcoming, I show the complexity of quilombola social relations in scenes of affection, surveillance, avoidance and/or control, among quilombo residents and so important for the group's sociality. Thus, the work seeks to contribute to the ethnographic literature regarding hospitality but based on daily life in Melha. In methodological terms, the research is the result of ethnography carried out, still in my doctorate, during the years 2019 to 2023, for this, I make use of the material collected in field research.
Cosmopolitics of resistance: a critical reading of Entre risos e perigos, by Suzane de Alencar Vieira
Review of the book Entre risos e perigos: artes da resistência e ecologia quilombola no Alto Sertão da Bahia (2023), by Suzane de Alencar Vieira.
Ewé Lati Wòsàn: Sheet to heal – Digital Museum on the Memory of Knowledge and Practice of using Herbs as a form of care and healing by the religious people of Terreiros de Candomblé
This article reflects on the constitution of the Digital Museum and how it is being used as an important tool for safeguarding and preserving the memory and heritage of the Traditional Peoples of Terreiro, who have built digital museums for the preservation and dissemination of their memories. Subsequently, it brought outlines of the author's research, which is ongoing in the Multidisciplinary Postgraduate Program in Ethnic and African Studies, at UFBA. The main objective of the research is to create a collaborative digital Museum about the know-how of using Herbs in the care and healing process in Terreiros de Candomblé in the cities of Cachoeira and São Félix, Recôncavo da Bahia.
Museu Digital; Museu Digital de terreiro; Saberes e fazeres de utilização das ervas em terreiros de candomblé.
Your Face Is Also Reflected in the Mirror, Pale Face": Brazilian Anthropology and Its Narcissistic Pact with Whiteness
The aim of this essay is to discuss racial and ethnic dynamics in the formation of anthropological science, especially in the hegemonic notion of Brazilian anthropology, which recognizes itself as different because it doesn't operate on the basis of exoticism. However, I understand that the exoticism delegated to world anthropology was replicated with Brazil's internal natives, namely whites in the position of subject while blacks, indigenous people and quilombolas were essentially objects. In order to scrutinize this narrative, I use the productions of the discipline to examine its development as a scientific, political and subjective undertaking, and the concept of the Narcissistic Pact of Whiteness to analyze how, implicitly, it has contributed to a unique history of Anthropology. To do this, I recover the work of black and indigenous researchers who, in their encounter with the white otherness of academic anthropologists, have identified tacitly violent practices. Finally, I present the potential of racial parity in research and the urgency of deconstructing whiteness as a possible means for an equitable, honest and multi-epistemic Anthropology.
Betwwwn the Visible and the enchanted: The tadâwan ritual among the Kurâ-Bakairi
&quot;Tadâwan Kurâ-Bakairi&quot; (2021), based on Erik Timóteo Iwyrâkâ Kamikiawa’s master’s research, offers a window into the cultural complexity of the Kurâ-Bakairi — of which the author is himself a member — through an in-depth exploration of the mythology that confers substance and significance upon the ritual use of the Tadâwan, a set of ceremonial flutes. Within his ethnographic account, the author elucidates both the visible and the invisible dimensions of his people’s cultural universe, constructing a narrative that underscores musicality as a principle that organizes the community’s existential horizon. This centrality, expressed through myth and ritual, is what animates the process of revitalizing the tradition of the Tadâwan among the Kurâ-Bakairi, which stands as the central focus of the work.
Embroidering Trouble: Creating Stories with the Mango Trees of the Mituaçu Quilombo Community
This essay aims to reflect on the embroidery "Cenário Fabuloso" (“Fabulous Scene”), created from the storytelling of women from the Mituaçu quilombo in Conde, Paraíba (Brazil). The story, textualized in textile, points to the socialities between the women and the plants of the community. Beyond the aesthetic elements, I propose in this work to consider embroidery as a starting point, process, and result of anthropological research. The lines of the embroidery suggest possibilities for a shared anthropology, concerned with its methodologies and curious about storytelling and its fabulations.
Michael Löwy, Surrealism, and a Profane Re-enchantment of the World
This review proposes a reading of Michael Löwy's book The Incandescent Comet – Romanticism, Surrealism, Subversion through the categories of memory and experience, reflecting, on one hand, on the organization of its sections and, on the other, on its heterogeneous content, where these categories emerge as a dialectical tension between the past and a utopian future. The work, composed of essays, textual fragments, and documents, explores the relationships between Surrealism, Romanticism, and Marxism, highlighting the dialectical tension between the past and the revolutionary horizon through theoretical explorations and analyses of historical figures, events, and places, as well as their elective affinities with Surrealism. Organized into four sections — Profane Illuminations, Constellations, Surrealist Women, and Surrealist Capitals — the book addresses themes such as radical freedom, language and magic, and resistance to the mechanization of bodies, creating tension between memory, experience, art, social theory, and revolution.
The Afro Digital Museum of UFMA: a virtual collection experience in Maranhão
The Afro Digital Museum of Maranhão, linked to the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at UFMA (Federal University of Maranhão), through the Religion and Popular Culture Research Group – GP Mina, brings together a collection composed of photographs, research documents, films, and recordings about Afro-Brazilian and Afro-Indigenous cultures. This material is organized into thematic collections that address Religions, Popular Culture, Quilombos (maroon settlements), Festivals, and Rituals. Available on a digital platform (https://museuafro.ufma.br), the collection allows for research and extension projects, as well as fostering debate on the articulation between heritage, education, and technology. This article proposes to present an account of the MAD-MA/UFMA's experience, describing its trajectory, objectives, and activities developed, with the aim of highlighting its relevance in the construction of collective memory and in the valorization of historically invisibilized cultures, through the dialogue between Culture and Technology.
Museu Digital; Cultura; Educação; Tecnologia
Illness between the normal and the critical: poverty and suffering in everyday life
Review of the book "Affliction: Health, Sickness, Poverty" by Venna Das (2023).
Reflections on the Post-colonial Process in Mozambique: Memory, Trauma and Politics
Review of the book Memória e Política no Moçambique Contemporâneo: sobre violências Pós-Coloniais (2022), by Victor Miguel Castillo de Macedo
antropologia, história, política internacional