CONVIVIALITY AND BECOMINGS WITH-IN DIFFERENCE. MORE-THAN-HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS IN CANDOMBLÉ

Abstract

In Candomblé, existence and the continuation of life are dependent on a complex dynamic of interactions involving humans and non-humans (objects, artifacts, the environment, animals, plants, minerals, the ancestors, spiritual beings, forces). It is an ontological monism, based on the concept of àṣẹ, the life force that constitutes life in its manifestations; a conception of human beings as a composition of spiritual and material components (in which ancestors, elements of nature and divine particles participate); ways of communicating and connecting with natural phenomena, the ancestors and the spiritual world; the forms of conceiving of, living with and treating health and disease; and ways of making kin all express a mode of existence, of inhabiting the world and developing along lines of life in which all more-than-human beings participate. The centrality of water, breath and blood – all of which have the ability to flow inside and outside of the body and from one body to another and are the major expressions of life – in rituals, transmission of knowledge, daily care and social relations, expresses fluidity and networks of connectivity and conviviality, as well as the incompleteness of all beings. Furthermore, the centrality of Èṣù, òrìṣà of crossroads and encounters, which ensures movement, communication and the dynamic balance of forces in the Cosmos and society, is the foundational principle of Candomblé cosmogony. The current study is based on an ethnographic study carried out at the Àṣe Idasilẹ Ọdẹ of Bàbá Marcelo Monteiro Odearofa, a Candomblé terreiro in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.