Re-Africanization and the Cultural Politics of Bahianidade

Abstract

This article examines racial politics in Brazil by analyzing the city of Salvador da Bahia's cultural policies over time and their relationship to national ideology and racial identity in Brazil more generally. It argues that the re-Africanization of Salvador's Carnival and its historical center, the Pelourinho, although initially products of the mobilization of Afro-Bahians themselves, have become institutionalized and ironically serve today as testaments to Brazil's diversity, tolerance, and integration. In light of increasing “ethnic” tourism to Bahia, this article highlights the paradox behind and the fundamental contradictions in a culturalist approach to race-based political mobilization in the Bahian context, and perhaps Brazil more generally. Because African culture has been such a central part of constructing modern Brazilian national identity and racial democracy, a culturally based movement, even one challenging the deeply embedded racial hierarchy, can paradoxically reify the myth of racial democracy.

Keywords:

• Bahia
• Black movements
• Brazil
• cultural commodification
• culture
• Latin America
• nationalism
• Race
• racial democracy