Afro-Brazilian Culture and Politics - Bahia, 1790s to 1990s

The essays in this book constitute an analytic survey of the last two centuries of Afro-Bahian history, with a focus squarely on the difficult relationship between Afro- and Euro-Bahia and on the continual Afro-Bahian struggle to create a meaningful culture in an environment either hostile or suffocating its ability to absorb elements of Afro-Bahian culture.

The three chapters on Candomblé, (in the 1860s, at the turn of the twentieth century and in the 1990s), along with the introduction, provide an able survey of this Afro-Brazilian religion's development and relationship to the larger society, and the chapters on black militia officers in Brazilian independence, Afro-Brazilians on the cacau frontier, and cultural policy during the military dictatorship highlight the importance of the state in constraining Afro-Bahians and demonstrate the various ways in which Bahians of African descent struggled to better their lives.