POLICREDOS - Religions and Society

Seminar| POLICREDOS WORKING GROUP

Neo-Pentecostalism and the Fragmentation of Secularism: Violence and Religious Racism in Brazil Today

Bruno Maurício Mattos Martins

Cristiano Henrique Ribeiro dos Santos

October 25, 2022, 17h00 (GMT+1)

Online event

Comments/Moderator: Luciane Lucas dos Santos (CES/POLICREDOS)


About

Violence against religious sites of African matrix (especially of Yorùbá, Bantu and Fon origin) and their devotees in Brazil, practiced mainly by neo-Pentecostals, is not only sectarianism and hatred of beliefs. Rather, it is part of a deeper context of a political power project rooted at the executive, legislative and judicial levels in the country. The demonisation of Afro-Brazilian cults and divinities has a dimension that goes from historical persecution since the colonial period to hatred in the digital social networks. The determination of the spiritual “enemy”, source of all the evils of common life, serves political and marketing-corporate strategies.

The main objective of this seminar is to understand how actors seen as political, social and religious enemies of the evangelical community are represented in the midst of a spiritual and moral war, while a Christian identity forged at the risk of an alleged persecution at a global level is reconciled. This seminar also intends to discuss the relations between politics, religion and intolerance of difference, with particular attention to the period preceding the elections in Brazil and how the neo-Pentecostal media have been disseminators of the so-called "fake news".
 


Bio note 

Cristiano Henrique is an Adjunct Professor at the School of Communication, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. He holds a PhD (2009) and a Master's degree (2002) in Communication and Culture from the School of Communication at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (ECO / UFRJ). He holds a degree in History from the Institute of Philosophy and Human Sciences of the State University of Rio de Janeiro (1996). Has experience in the following themes: public opinion research, audience and programming studies, as well as academic studies on religious communities of African matrix. Currently, he is dedicated to research on forms of belonging and self-management of Candomblé communities as organizations of urban quilombos and research methodologies in social networks. He is researcher and vice-coordinator of LECC-UFRJ - Laboratório de Estudos em Comunicação Comunitária. He is also the coordinator of NACO - Núcleo de Apoio à Comunicação do ILÉ À ÒGÚN ÀLÁKÒRÓ (Spiritualist Institution Oni Lewa Njo - Terreiro de Candomblé Ketu) and general project coordinator of Quilombo de Bongaba (Kilombá) - both in Magé, Rio de Janeiro. He is a member of the group Àwúre - Candomblé de Tradição and organizer, at UFRJ, of the Forum Àwúre with priests of traditional houses of religions of African Matrix.

Bruno Maurício Mattos Martins is a social communicator with a degree in Journalism from the School of Communication of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (Eco-UFRJ). He is a member of the research group NetLab - Microsociology and Network Studies. He works in research on the dissemination of misinformation and harmful content on digital platforms.

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This activity will be provided through Zoom platform and does not require registration. Participation is limited to the number of places available >https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88479887768 | ID: 884 7988 7768 | Password: 419040

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