ABSTRACT

The statement made by a Brazilian taxi driver is emblematic of a common assumption: that samba as practised in Rio de Janeiro is the benchmark of authenticity for Brazil's national music and dance. In addition to being distinct from Rio-style samba in terms of sound, movement and gender conventions, samba de roda also stands apart from another Bahian samba variant known as pagode. By tactically situating themselves as part of samba de roda, participants in urban June Samba effectively appropriate the prestige and cultural value that is now associated with the rural practice by virtue of its UNESCO recognition. Within a diverse and changing range of samba sounds and movements, newly bound by competing notions of legitimacy and cultural ownership, self-identified working-class black Bahians now harness samba de roda's elevated status in ways that assert new models for community empowerment and uplift often through reconfigured notions of samba authenticity.