Under the Mast of the Holy Spirit: A Night of Colors and Rhythms in the Santa Lúcia Neighborhood

Abstract

This text is a narrative synthesis of the perspectives, interests, and writing styles—both individual and complementary—of three researchers who, during the 2023 August Festivities in Montes Claros, sought to grasp the multiple layers and meanings of an event marked by different temporalities, forms of sociability, and experiences of urban life. More than a mere backdrop, the city—understood here also through its small multiplicities—is a constitutive dimension of the festivity, as revealed by the fieldwork that followed, over the course of one night, a specific ethnographic context: the Mastro do Divino Espírito Santo in the Santa Lúcia neighborhood (Montes Claros, MG).