Tulane University
- Center For Global Development
- Center For Global Education
- Center For Inter-american Policy And Research
- Central America
- Child Health
- Children's Literature
- Cuba Abroad
- Cuba Embargo
- Cuba-us Relations
- Cuban & Caribbean S
- Cuban & Caribbean Studies
- Cuban Ambassador
- Cuban And Caribbean Studies Institute
- Cuban Artists
- Cuban Film
- Cuban Heritage Collection
- Cuban Theater
- Cuban-american
- Day Of The Dead
- Declining Inequality
- Declining Inequality In Latin America
- Delgado
- Democracy
- Development
- Diaspora
- Disaster Relief
- Disaster Resilience Leadership Academy
- Diversity
- Dominican Republic
- Doris Stone Librarian And Director
- General Latin America
- Glick Fellowship
- Global Development
- Globalization
- Graduate Conference
- Graduate Research
- Graduate Student Conference
- Graduate Students
- Gran Fiesta
- Grants & Fellowships
- Greenleaf
- Greenleaf Fellow
- Indigenous Latin American Languages
- Inequality
- Inter-american Relations
- International Health & Development
- International Programs
- International Relations
- Lasa
- Lasa 2010
- Latin America
- Latin American Library
- Latin American Studies
- Latin Americanist Graduate Association
- Mexican Cultural Institute
- Mexico
- Mexico-u.s. Border
- Miami
- Middle America
- Middle American Research Institute
- Natural Disasters
- Neoliberalism
- New Oreleans
- New Orleans
- New Orleans Center For The Gulf South
- New Orleans Film Festival
- Santiago De Cuba
- School Of Architecture
- School Of Law
- School Of Liberal Arts
- School Of Public Health & Tropical Medicine
- School Of Public Health And Tropical Medicine
- School Of Science & Engineering
- School Of Social Work
- Semester Abroad
- Sexuality
- Slave Rebellion
- Slave Trade
- Staff
- State-society Relations
- Stone Center
- Stone Center For Latin American Studies
- Stone Center Summer Abroad
- Student Funding
- (120) Cuba
- (62) Caribbean
- (46) General Latin America
- (42) Haiti
- (30) Cuban & Caribbean Studies
- (29) New Wave
- (14) Art
- (14) Future Of Cuba
- (14) Music
- (13) Cuba-us Relations
- (13) Stone Center For Latin American Studies
- (12) Study Abroad
- (12) South America
- (12) Literature
- (11) Latin America
- (11) Core Faculty
- (10) Community
- (10) Puerto Rico
- (6) Slavery
- (6) School Of Public Health And Tropical Medicine
- (6) Immigration
- (6) Spanish & Portuguese
- (6) Jamaica
- (6) Art History
- (6) North America
- (5) Hispanic Heritage Month
- (5) African Diaspora
- (5) Social Justice
- (5) Venezuela
- (5) Environment
- (5) Public Health In Cuba
- (5) Social Policy
- (5) Architecture
- (5) Greenleaf Fellows
- (4) Colombia
- (4) Events
- (4) Center For Inter-american Policy And Research
- (4) Social Work
- (4) Political Science
- (4) Tulane
- (4) Socialism
- (4) Food And Culture
- (4) Graduate Conference
- (4) Summer Study Abroad
- (4) Law
- (3) Photo Competition
- (3) Political Economy
- (3) Environmental Studies
- (3) Identity
- (3) Spanish
- (3) Coffee
- (3) Performance
- (3) Performing Arts
- (3) A.b. Freedman School Of Business
- (3) Language
- (3) Slave Trade
- (3) Graduate Students
- (3) Honduras
- (3) Immigrants
- (3) Politics Of Migration
- (3) Africana Studies
- (3) Revolution
- (3) School Of Social Work
- (3) Pebbles Center
- (3) Mesoamerica
- (3) Louisiana
- (3) Book Talk
- (3) Exhibitions
- (3) Reading Project
- (3) Film Studies
- (3) Symposium
- (3) Community Events
- (2) Social Movements
- (2) Archive
- (2) New Orleans Film Festival
- (2) Graduate Research
- (2) Diversity
- (2) Cuban Artists
- (2) Haitian Revolution
- (2) Lasa
- (2) Foreign Policy
- (2) Urban History
- (2) Urban Planning
- (2) Middle American Research Institute
- (2) Us-mexico Border
- (2) Study In Latin America
- (2) Student Funding
- (2) Spanish America
- (2) Linguistics
- (2) Afro-caribbean Religion
- (2) Language And Culture
- (2) Museum
- (2) Hurricane
- (2) Critical Race Theory
- (2) Black History Month
- (2) Cuban And Caribbean Studies Institute
- (2) Lasa 2010
- (2) Newcomb
- (2) Celebración Latina
- (2) International Programs
- (2) Poetry
- (2) Festivals
- (2) Affiliated Faculty
- (2) Caribbean Literature
- (2) West Indies
- (2) Exhibition
- (2) France
- (2) Inter-american Relations
- (2) Teacher Workshop
- (2) Ecology & Evolutionary Biology
- (2) Postcolonial Studies
- (2) Curriculum Unit
- (2) Travel
- (2) Greenleaf
- (2) Jazz
- (2) Undergraduate Conference
- (2) Human Development
- (2) Film Series
- (2) Staff
- (2) Celebracion Latina
- (1) Social Conflict
- (1) Social Studies
- (1) Non-profit
- (1) Indigenous Latin American Languages
- (1) Hurricane Katrina
- (1) Environmental Governance
- (1) Southern Cone
- (1) K-12 Cuba Teacher Institute
- (1) Commitment To Equity
- (1) French
- (1) Lgbtqa+
- (1) Fundraising
- (1) Office Of Multicultural Affairs
- (1) Contemporary Arts Center
- (1) International Students
- (1) Chile
- (1) K-12 Teacher Workshop
- (1) Audubon Zoo
- (1) Oliver Houck
- (1) Afro Latinos
- (1) Foodways
- (1) Social Inclusion
- (1) Cuban & Caribbean S
- (1) Trauma Institute
- (1) Graduate Student Conference
- (1) City
- (1) Maya Symposium
- (1) Belize
- (1) Disaster Resilience Leadership Academy
- (1) Afro-brazilian
- (1) Lago Conference
- (1) U.s.-cuban Relations
- (1) Children's Literature
- (1) Migrant
- (1) Declining Inequality
- (1) Declining Inequality In Latin America
- (1) Immigrant
- (1) Day Of The Dead
- (1) Mexico-u.s. Border
- (1) Colonialism
- (1) Latin Americanist Graduate Association
- (1) Colonial Era
- (1) Undergraduate
- (1) Teacher Workshop; Outreach
- (1) Mexican Consulate
- (1) Police Violence
- (1) Mexican Cultural Institute
- (1) Globalization
- (1) Greenleaf Fellow
- (1) Global Development
- (1) Social Equity
- (1) New Orleans Center For The Gulf South
- (1) Africa
- (1) Cimafunk
- (1) Writing
- (1) Carnaval
- (1) New Orleans Jazz Museum
- (1) Stone Center Summer Abroad
- (1) Language Learning
- (1) Gran Fiesta
- (1) Festival
- (1) Centenarios
- (1) Reception
- (1) Stone Center
- (1) Greenleaf Fellowship Program
- (1) Nola
- (1) Christian Science Monitor
- (1) Grants & Fellowships
- (1) Peru
- (1) Natural Disasters
- (1) Hip Hop
- (1) Guitar
- (1) School Of Law
- (1) Trinidad & Tobago
- (1) Bahamas
- (1) Asia
- (1) Vietnam
- (1) School Of Public Health & Tropical Medicine
- (1) International Health & Development
- (1) The Latin American Library
- (1) Doris Stone Librarian And Director
- (1) School Of Architecture
- (1) Emeritus Faculty
- (1) French & Italian
- (1) Tulanian
- (1) Associate Professor
- (1) Europe
- (1) School Of Science & Engineering
- (1) Theatre & Dance
- (1) Haitian Creole
- (1) Tropical Medicine
- (1) Neoliberalism
- (1) Job Opportunity
- (1) Title Vi
- (1) Maternal Health
- (1) Santiago De Cuba
- (1) Payson Center
- (1) Trade
- (1) Social Entrepreneurship
- (1) Child Health
- (1) Researcher
- (1) Indigenous Languages
- (1) Miami
- (1) Cuban Heritage Collection
- (1) Cipr Post-doctoral Fellowship
- (1) Glick Fellowship
- (1) U.s.
- (1) President Obama
Brazilian Music Expresses People's Struggles
July 15th, 2011
By: Mary Ann Travis
mtravis@tulane.edu
The country of Brazil has a distinctiveness all its own. Its citizens speak Portuguese, for one thing. And to an extent not seen in most other countries, popular music is an essential part of the identity of Brazil, says Christopher Dunn, associate professor of Spanish and Portuguese at Tulane.
Photo: Chico Science and Nação Zumbi perform with their band in Recife, Brazil, in 1995. They were the leading proponents of ‘mangue beat,‘ which combined psychedelic rock, electronica and hip-hop with regional rhythms such as maracatu, coco and ciranda. (Photo by Gil Vicente)
‘Brazil might, in fact, be the most salient example of a country in which popular music has had an important role in society and politics and in the formation of cultural identity,‘ Dunn says.
It‘s an issue of degree, says Dunn. In other countries, popular music plays in the background. But in Brazil, ‘Music is central to Brazilian notions of personal and national identity.‘
With Idelber Avelar, professor of Spanish and Portuguese at Tulane, Dunn co-edited Brazilian Popular Music and Citizenship (Duke University Press, 2011). ‘We both have a deep interest in Brazilian music,‘ says Dunn, and both are affiliated with the Stone Center for Latin American Studies at Tulane.
Dunn and Avelar collaborated on collecting, editing and translating the essays in the book, many of them originally written in Portuguese by Brazilian scholars, including anthropologists, historians, literary scholars and ethnomusicologists. Among other contributors to the book are Daniel Sharp, Tulane assistant professor of music, and Aaron Lorenz, who earned a PhD in Latin American studies from Tulane in 2009.
The essays go beyond the formal study of Brazilian music per se, although there are discussions of samba, coco, maracatu and bossa nova as well as international genres that have been Brazilianized such as hip-hop, funk, rock and even the waltz. ‘What we really wanted to do is capture a range of debate and discussion around citizenship in Brazil,‘ says Dunn.
The citizenship that Dunn is talking about is not about how people literally become citizens. ‘It‘s about the long struggle for people gaining rights in the country ‘” civil rights, social rights, political rights, cultural rights.
‘We‘re interested in how music has played a role in these struggles,‘ says Dunn.
Related + People
Christopher Dunn
Idelber Avelar

Copyright © 2021 Roger Thayer Stone Center For Latin American Studies All Rights Reserved.
Tulane University, 100 Jones Hall, New Orleans, LA 70118 (504) 865-5164 rtsclas@tulane.edu