Paper short abstract:

This work analyses men and women's ways of access to musical instruments in two Brazilian folklore dances, the bumba meu boi and the maracatu, which are experiencing symbolic re-signification and valorization regarding affirmation practices of regional identities in Brazilian nation.

Paper long abstract:

Maracatu (Pernambuco) and Bumba meu boi (Maranhão) became both affirmation symbols of regional identity, in a process of symbolic rivalry among agents of political, economical and cultural field. Such dances are perceived locally as traditional (of long term and with the constancy of specific contents) and performed by poor people and with a specific aesthetics (in contrast with mass and erudite cultures). They can be seen under the concept of popular culture. Popular culture allows one to notice the internal dynamics of these parties, the tensions that emerge from the social positions of the agents involved in its valorization and the power differences between them. Also, gender issues emerged when the new meanings of these dances changed the relation between women and men in them. In both dances music is becoming an important mediator to attract people from media classes to these parties, which were once considered as being an event of black and poor people, and therefore (dangerous). Music has an equal or superior value than the dance core, and its recordings extends its enjoyment. Women's access to instruments and music is a source of polemics, and some instrument performances are still forbidden to them, for being associated to power and prestige. The comprehensive gender values are set in motion in order to compose an hierarchy for women's disadvantage.