Between food, dance and territorial struggles: Coconut Festival and the Anacé from Parnamirim (CE)

Abstract

Since the 1990 decade, many enterprises settled in the territory claimed by the Anacé Indigenous People, located between Caucaia and São Gonçalo do Amarante municipalities, to the west from Fortaleza. As a consequence, many indigenous families were removed from the territory into new settlements and into an indigenous reservation. Due to a new attempt to remove the Anacé from Parnamirim, the indigenous people began to articulate new strategies of resistance, thus, performing, in 2022, the Coconut Festival. Based on document analysis, interviews with indigenous leaders and participant observation, an investigation was conducted on this resistance form, noticing the way this indigenous struggle is being complexified and how food culture, intertwined with dance and rituals, is triggered as an important means of struggle, creating networks of belonging and engagement. By sharing dance and food, the Anacé People are creating common spaces, constructing and reconstructing sensibilities mobilized for the struggle for the territory, articulating the food politics with the territories politics.