Specialists discuss black African culture and heritage

On November 5, the FGV Little Africa Chair will hold its concluding seminar. After almost a year of work, the three chair-holders, Inaicyra Falcão, Leda Maria Martins and Rosana Paulino, will come together to take stock of the year’s activities and discuss black thought in Brazil. The FGV Little Africa Chair’s 2024 Black Thought Seminar will take place at the Museum of Afro-Brazilian History and Culture, in the Gamboa neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The other speakers will include Carmen Luz, a choreographer and filmmaker; Muniz Sodré, a sociologist; Carolina Alves, documentation coordinator at FGV CPDOC in Rio de Janeiro; Thiago Amparo, a lawyer and professor at the FGV Sao Paulo Law School; and Yago Feitosa, the Rio de Janeiro municipal government’s racial equality promotion coordinator.

The FGV Little Africa Chair is an initiative run jointly by FGV Knowledge and the municipal government of Rio de Janeiro. It is the first academic chair dedicated entirely to black intellectuals in Brazil, with the aim of stimulating interdisciplinary debate on social, cultural and academic issues, focusing on black African culture and heritage. Every year, an interdisciplinary committee will choose an intellectual with a recognized track record in their field to carry out a series of activities over the course of that year. Like the chair-holders, the committee is also made up solely of black professionals.

Cycles

In 2024, three professionals were selected to undertake the chair’s activities. The first cycle took place on August 5 and 6, when a course called “Archives, Memory, Visual Construction and Education” was taught by visual artist Rosana Paulino. On September 3 and 4, there was another course, titled “Nzilas D’Ingoma: The Black Kingdoms,” taught by Leda Maria Martins, a poet, essayist and playwright. In the third cycle, held on October 16 and 17, professor and singer Inaicyra Falcão taught a course called “Bodies and Ancestries.”

Following each of the courses, the chair-holders got together with guests in open meetings called “Dialogues in the Library,” held in the FGV Cultural Center’s library foyer. Rosana Paulino had a conversation with the curator of the Rio de Janeiro Modern Art Museum, Raquel Barreto; Leda Maria Martins had a conversation with Professor Eduardo Oliveira of Bahia Federal University; and Inaicyra Falcão had a talk with Professor Muniz Sodré.

Parallel activities

The FGV Little Africa Chair also involved the creation of an extension project involving social science undergraduate students at FGV CPDOC and the acquisition of a series of books by black intellectuals to form a special collection at the Mario Henrique Simonsen Library.