Capoeira do povo

Exploited, plundered, assaulted and unknown, this anonymous mass is called o povo. (Roberto DaMatta, 1991: 2).

We are working with a cultural force, we know the cultural value of capoeira and its strength to develop o povo because capoeira is really their culture. Capoeira is popular culture, she has to be part of o povo. For the people, with the people. In this way we get socio - cultural evolution. (Mestre Russo)

In 1973 Russo and a group of friends ,instigated their first roda in the street of Caxias, since that date every week Russo and his friends and students have met up to manifest capoeira in the streets of Caxias. This cultural phenomenon is known as the roda livre of Caxias.

Russo describes the the roda livre as having an inverse form of organisation to that of the capoeira academia and the pugilistic federation of Rio de Janeiro (with which the academies of capoeira were associated. The roda livre was presenting capoeira to the people [o povo] as the people’s own culture. “The revolutionary's role is to liberate, and be liberated with the people.” (Freire: 1970: 76). The academia system was one patronised by members of state institutions such as the military and the police, when there were graduations of capoeirista's it was done in reference to the Brazilian flag, thus favourable to the government.


As street capoeira (capoeira de rua) players, Russo and the other members of the roda livre suffered discrimination because of their non - allegiance and rejection of state sanctioned capoeira schools, and their allegiance to the unregulated capoeira of the street.

Russo explained that the roda livre had a different agenda to the government sanctioned capoeira academies. The academia system had to support an ideology of Brazilian nationalism in the context of the dictatorship, while the street capoeira was dedicated to the popular culture of capoeira itself. The connotations of street capoeira were very negative.

In the past very violent things have happened in the roda of Caxias. Mestre Russo has been stabbed in the chest during a game by a disruptive visiting capoeira player, and pistols have been pulled from belts and aimed in the roda. Capoeira players used to come in groups to the roda's of Caxias to try to stop it from happening.

In the seventies and eighties there was discrimination against street capoeira, as the general mode of capoeira was being institutionalised. Russo told me that the roda livre was attacked because of its ideology. The academia was allied to the government, while the street roda was allied with the culture and the people. This ideological clash led to confrontations in the roda livre between capoeira players from capoeira academies and the capoeira de rua.

The roda livre of Caxias facilitated these confrontations because it took place in the free space of the street, which allowed other capoeira groups access because it was in the public domain, not the private domain of the capoeira academy. The Caxiense capoeiristas’ decision to devote themselves to capoeira of the street was done at a time when this was completely against the general mode of Capoeira. They were discriminated against and attacked because of their refusal to conform to the institutional version of capoeira.