Candomblé Objects: From Criminal Anthropology to National Ethnographic Museums

Lecture by Zainabu Jallo, Kulturwissenschaftlerin, Center for Global Studies, Universität Bern.

The origins of the Afro-Brazilian religion Candomblé date back to the 1500s when West African slaves sought ways to retain their religious practices. At the beginning of the 20th century, some Brazilian newspapers created negative stereotypes of the religion and published articles about police raids, accompanied by names and images of those prosecuted. Since then, the practice of Candomblé has witnessed a shift from being a closed sacred cult, fraught with discrimination and persecution, to its incorporation into a new national character in Brazil.

The talk analyses the transition of Candomblé ritual artefacts from the domain of Criminal Anthropology to Cultural Anthropology and looks at the changing contexts in which Candomblé artefacts ultimately became valuable items of Brazil’s cultural heritage.