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- Title
Indigenous Games: A Struggle between Past and Present.
- Authors
Rocha Ferreira, Maria Beatriz
- Abstract
Indigenous games are part of the symbolic patrimonial heritage of indigenous peoples. The aims of this paper are to present the main characteristics of indigenous games, the impact of colonization processes on the fact that games have been forgotten, and the mechanisms that indigenous peoples use to revitalize them in new contexts. Accounts of the first voyagers and missionaries in the 16th century described how games were part of sacred ceremonies and rituals, which involve tension and excitement. In numerous accounts and interviews about games that are still being practiced today, we can note characteristics related to time: the games represent a break in everyday activities and point back to a mythical time, with a union between the individual and the cosmos, moments of transformation, a passage from one state to another, and emotions, such as pleasure, joy, sadness, pain, fear, anger and triumph. It is important to reinforce the idea that indigenous time is based on a different paradigm, which is cosmological and seasonal. In the past, colonizers considered indigenous ceremonies and rituals to be demonic and barbaric because they were not compatible with occidental cultural models. For this reason, many rituals and games were forced into oblivion and disappeared. The effects of globalization and the distancing of today's people from their ancestors' traditions are also harmful to the preservation of traditional games. But in recent decades, movements of different international and Brazilian political indigenous peoples have influenced resignifications of their societies. Even indigenous peoples who were considered decimated were able to reorganize in new ways. Since 1996, indigenous leaders have participated in a movement to revitalize games. One of their steps was to organize the Indigenous Peoples' Games, the elements of which join ancestral indigenous cultures with the contemporary world.
- Subjects
INDIGENOUS peoples; GAMES; GLOBALIZATION; SPORTS
- Publication
ICSSPE Bulletin (17285909), 2014, Issue 67, p48
- ISSN
1728-5909
- Publication type
Article