With Dance and Drum. A Psychocultural Investigation of the Ritual Meaning-Making System of an Afro-Brazilian, Macumba Community in Salvador, Brazil

Authors

• Valerie DeMarinis Uppsala University

DOI: https://doi.org/10.30674/scripta.67223

Keywords:

Dance, Religious, Ritual, Drum, Brazil, Psychology and religion, Afro-Brazilian cults, Gender, Women, Yoruba (African people), Christianity and Amerindian religions, Salvador (Brazil), Life cycle, Trance

Abstract

This paper focuses on the Macumba community's way of making meaning in its Afro-Brazilian cultural context. The community's meaning-making system is analyzed through five central points relating psychosocial function to religious ritual experience. In this Macumba community context ritual, through dance and drum, serves as the basic multi-dimensional vehicle for psychosocial and spiritual development in the community.