XVII Congress of the Brazilian Studies Association

Becoming Sem Terra: Political Rituals Among Brazil’s Landless Rural Workers’ Movement (MST)

• In Event: 40 years of Sem Terra: Ethnographic perspectives on the significance of the Landless Workers Movement's struggle

Abstract

How does a geographically dispersed, ethnically diverse rural social movement survive, thrive, and reproduce itself over space and time? How are organizational commitments renewed when times are tough? Based on more than two years of ethnographic fieldwork with young Brazilian activists, this paper foregrounds the importance of political rituals in understanding the longevity and subjective potency of Landless Rural Workers’ Movement, MST. Empirically, this paper focuses on youth experiences of the MST’s VI National Congress, a week-long adventure where thousands of second-generation members were exposed to MST political culture. This paper utilizes classic anthropological insights to argue against static or deterministic notions of collective identity. Highlighting the importance of ritual participation, it argues that the landless identity ought to be understood as contingent and processual—the result of deliberate political socialization. With lessons for activists and academics in Brazil and beyond, it argues that the MST teaches us a great deal about the importance of symbols and rituals for keeping counterhegemonic struggles alive.

Author

• Melinda Gurr, Lahore University of Management Sciences