Xondaro Guarani: a performance marcial indígena como estratégia política imagética

Abstract

This work, presented to the Master’s course of the Graduate Program in Social Sciences (PPCIS) of UERJ’s Social Science Institute, emerged as a complement to the previous studies about the Guarani agonistic body practice called xondaro. Relating the body practice to the term martial art, this work intends to discuss how the xondaro happens as a way to promote the Guarani agency in social conflicts, apart from the body contact normally expected in a martial practice. The material analyzed corresponds to the union between the data collected in the fieldwork carried out in 2019 in the Pyau village (SP) and in the Sapukai village (RJ), apart from the data of the direct relationship with the Guarani indigenous people and a xondaro master since 2018. Dialogizing with both the field of performance anthropology and the anthropology of art by Alfred Gell, this work presents an analysis of the imagetic elements that emerged through the performances of dialogues and social movements analyzed, producing a body movement during the “collective fight” in order to obtain results in situations where the claim of rights and affirmations of Guarani identity appear as the main motivational elements.