Echoes of Brazil

Abstract

The stretch of coast between Accra and Lagos is home to four distinct national communities who identify as descendants of Brazilians: the Tabom in Ghana, the Brésiliens in Togo, the Agudas in Benin, and the Amaros in Nigeria. These communities were established by individuals who migrated from Brazil to West Africa in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, forming what is arguably Brazil’s oldest diaspora. Echoes of Brazil explores how these communities use music and dance to preserve, celebrate, and negotiate their complex allegiances—to Brazil, the ethnic groups they have integrated into, their West African nations, and the broader Black Atlantic community. The book argues that music is an ideal medium for the emergence of experiences where sound, emotion, and discourse about Brazilian ancestry can coalesce and reinforce one another. The diasporic condition of Brazilian-descendant communities in West Africa is therefore primarily grounded in deeply embodied experiences, rather than solely in discourse. To support this argument, the book adopts a phenomenological approach, focusing on people’s embodied experiences during both inter- and intra-community musical encounters. It documents how musicians from these communities deploy their signature genres—agbe, burrinha, and the characteristic combination of gbókùs and meboi—at home, during visits to each other, and even on trips to Brazil. As the first study to examine these four communities in tandem, rather than separately, the book underscores the importance of transnational connections within West Africa, Brazil, and the Black Atlantic, challenging conventional notions of home and diaspora.