Mestre Carneiro

Edison Carneiro (1912-1972), from Bahia, is considered a reference in the study of folklore and Afro-Brazilian narratives in Brazil. Author of the classic "Dinâmica do Folclore" (1965), he made great contributions to research in the area, defending folklore as something dynamic, in movement and transformation, not something static and immutable.

Family, ancestry and research

But who was this figure and why did he become so important? To understand, let's look at his history. Edison was the son of Antônio Joaquim de Souza Carneiro and Rosa Sanches de Souza. Today, with the advancement of discussions about race, Edison and his family would easily be classified as light-skinned blacks. However, considering that we are talking about a century ago, in the face of an upper-middle-class family that figured among the intellectuals, this blackness was often denied. This led the anthropologist Ruth Langes, who was his friend, to write, in a letter, something that today would be a metonymy for structural racism: "It was the type of family sometimes called 'white blacks,' because they were so respected."

Still, the theme of ancestry always ran through Edison's work, but also that of his father. Souza Carneiro was a retired engineering professor – forced to retire – from the Polytechnic School in 1932 due to political disagreements. He then dedicated himself to literature and research. During this time, he produced the book "African Myths in Brazil – Science of Folklore" (1937). As time passed, his advanced age, coupled with the disappointment of his departure, contributed to writing becoming his refuge, to the point of being criticized for publishing too much, sacrificing quality and rigor.

Regarding Souza Carneiro, Jorge Amado, who had been Edison's friend since adolescence, wrote kindly: "He was a magician, lived surrounded by celestial forces, and I believe he could foresee. He exercised absolute power over all the spiritist centers in Salvador, a specialist in Allan Kardec and other masters of mediumship […]. A magician, without a doubt, dreaming of the future, incapable of any pettiness, so detached from miseries, wickedness, and ugliness that it was difficult to distinguish in old Souza Carneiro the boundary that separates reality from imagination. We adored him; we had in him not only a master but also a companion."

The young sorcerer

The nickname "magician" was almost an honorary title that Jorge Amado also perceived inherited in his son. On March 5, 1937, the writer published, in the newspaper Estado da Bahia, the article “The Young Sorcerer”, in homage to his friend Edison Carneiro. In it, he praised the man known for taking friends to spiritual leaders, guiding them through the beauty of Candomblé.

It was the time of the release of “Negros Bantus”, Edison's acclaimed book that came a year after “Religiões Negras”. Jorge Amado praised the production, identifying him as an intellectual who was also involved in the religions he studied.

“A book by someone who knows the subject not only through reading, not only through what he has read in others, but from someone who knows it through direct contact. He is an ogã, he lived in those environments […] It is above all a study done by a man of the same race as those studied [He] has nothing dilettante about him […] With the African race of Bahia, he suffered, he laughed heartily […] He is one of them and thus this study, this testimony, gains in strength and truth […] It is said by a member of the black religions who is at the same time one of the most cultured subjects in Brazil.”

Folklore and social transformation

Edison's artistic and reflective relationship with Jorge Amado began in the 1920s, when both were part of a group known as the "Academy of Rebels." It was there that they discussed Marxist authors who would directly influence the production of both. It was inspired by Gramsci and his text on folklore in the Prison Notebooks that Edison found the foundation for "Folklore Dynamics," a text written in 1950 and compiled and edited in 1965.

More than the fundamental understanding that folklore is not a past, dead culture, but rather living practices permeated with current events, Edison defended the revolutionary power of the culture of the popular classes. For him, even though it carries many conservative elements and reification of the status quo, folklore carries within itself the germ of social transformation. After all, it arises and flourishes within the people, being guided by them. He invites us to understand traditional manifestations as more than poetic; but as commentary, a platform, and a claim by those who have been excluded from the hegemonic processes of society.

Because of his thinking, Edison was persecuted and silenced by the Military Dictatorship. He, who held the presidency of the Campaign for the Defense of Brazilian Folklore, was immediately deposed on April 1, 1964. The National Folklore Commission itself was closed, accused of being a den of communists. Nothing that recognized the power of the people was well-regarded during a period of control and domination.