XVII Congress of the Brazilian Studies Association

Imagining Communities of Resistance: Towards Transcollectivities in Contemporary Brazilian Cinema

• In Event: Towards a Transartistic Commons in Brazil

Abstract

In opposition to western thought’s valorization of individualism, my paper presentation will
focus on the films: Café com Canela (2017) co-directed by Glenda Nicácio and Ary Rosa and No
Coração do Mundo (2019) co-directed by Gabriel Martins and Maurílio Martins. With a focus
on the above films, I propose thinking transcollectivity as a method of inquiry into the organizing
potential of collective political imaginations on and off-screen. With a focus on the above films,
this paper furthers research into how film productions made between 2016-2023 in Brazil, or
between the years of the parliamentary coup that removed Dilma Rousseff as Brazil’s president
in 2016 paving the way for the extreme right Bolsonaro administration, until Lula’s return in
2023, are part of a trend in contemporary Brazilian cinema proposing collective political
resistance to the fascist state. Both films examined highlight collective organizing and
community aesthetics in distinct ways, yet they both center marginalized populations with a
focus on Black female citizenship, social class, peripheral thinking, and racialization in a
Brazilian context. Some of the questions examined are: How does the concept of transcollectivity
as an analytical framework to understand specific Brazilian films, function as a counternarrative
to the valorization of the individual and the personal journey philosophy in western films? How
are these two films exemplar of a trend in contemporary Brazilian cinema that imagines
transcollectivities as resistance to the oppressive politics of white nationalism, and ultraconservatism? These films imagine possible avenues for freedom and autonomy from the fascist state through grassroots community politics, collective organizing, and transgression.

Author

• Sarah Shamash, Emily Carr University of Art and Design