Capoeira Angola at Grupo Iuna: African Ancestral Knowledge and Counter-Colonial Relations

Abstract

In this article, we discuss African ancestral knowledge and counter-colonial forms of relationship based on the experience of the Grupo Iuna de Capoeira Angola. We start from the idea that this school preserves African ancestry in the research and teaching of Capoeira Angola. In dialogue with contemporary Latin American philosophy, we address the meanings and dynamics of Grupo Iuna, Capoeira Angola as African ancestral knowledge, the impacts of epistemicide on its understanding, the notion of the body as territory, and Capoeira as a force for quilombagem. We draw an analogy between the attack-defense dynamics inherent to the African fighting technique and the listen-speak relationship. This is a narrative writing supported by research that occurs through bodily movement and the exercise of orality. The central question guiding this work is: how does the African ancestral knowledge cultivated at Iuna teach co-living, promoting a counter-colonial way of being?