Brazilian Festival
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Wolran Kim
November 2012
I went to the Brazilian Festival at the Gallivan Center Downtown last weekend on September 8th. When I arrived there, around 400~500 people were dancing the samba on the lawn between buildings. On the stage, many musicians were adding to the amusement of people by playing instruments, dancing, and singing. The music was full of fun and familiarity, and the people were really excited. Many of them were wearing yellow and green T-shirts, which are the colors of their national flag, so I felt as if I were in Brazil. I have never been to Brazil and the only things I know about this country is that they are famous for football and coffee. I know one Brazilian, who is my daughter’s boyfriend, and he speaks fluent Portuguese, besides English. Many booths lined the lawn, selling indigenous Brazilian products, and people were eating food on the tables.
The Utah Brazilian Festival started in 2005 and this event was held annually at Thanksgiving Point, Utah Valley University, Gateway Mall, or the Gallivan Center. The Festival began with a small group of friends eager to celebrate their heritage and share it with the community that embraced them and has since become a greatly anticipated tradition. There are no precise estimates of how many Brazilians and descendents live nowadays in Utah. They also had the fundraising dinner for the second time following last year and opened it to the public. Viva Brazil Cultural Center is a non-profit organization dedicated to educate the public about Brazilian arts, tradition, culture, and language. It also has the purpose to facilitate communication and cooperation among the Brazilian community within and outside the state of Utah and to provide educational assistance.
They had a Samba Parade, Samba Fogo (drummers and fire dancers), Capoeira Show, Sponsor’s Presentation, Dance Workshop, Roberto Trevisan (playing Forro style music), Marcio Mendes, and Mix Brazil Band as an all day event from 1 pm to 7 pm. Capoeira is a Brazilian martial art that combines elements of dance and music. It was created in Brazil mainly by descendants of African slaves with Brazilian native influences, probably beginning in the 16th century. It is known for its quick and complex moves, using mainly power, speed, and leverage for leg sweeps. The word capoeira refers to the areas of low vegetation in the Brazilian interior.
The people’s lives and emotions melted into their culture. Culture is often understood as the concept of race or ethnicity because culture is a synthesis of different lifestyles in each group. According to Franz Boas (1858-1942), culture is a system of shared beliefs, values, customs, behaviors, and artifacts that the members of a society use to cope with their world and with one another, and that are transmitted from generation to generation through learning. Therefore, cultural events are the best chance to learn and enjoy features, religion, food, music, and fashion of other countries at a glance.
According to one estimate, around 1.1 million Brazilians live in the United States and 300,000 of them live in Florida (2008). The official United States Census category of Hispanic or Latino is limited explicitly to people of "Spanish culture or origin," and therefore does not include Brazilian Americans. The first recorded Brazilians to immigrate to the United States came in the 1960s. Before then, Brazilians were included in a group formed by all South American groups. Many Brazilian immigrants in the United States are university-educated, however, have settled for lower-status jobs because of the language barrier. The majority—nearly 90 percent—of Brazilian Americans are Roman Catholic.
Brazil’s official name is República Federativa de Brasil/Federative Republic of Brazil, which counts for about half of the entire continent of South America, and has 187 million in population. The capital is Brasilia and it borders all South American countries except Ecuador and Chile. Their traditional culture is increasingly scrambled with many others, such as those from indigenous India, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, as well as Portugal, which influenced their language and religion. Brazil successfully created their own culture through an assimilation of complex mixed blood, compared with Latin America, which gathered all different races. Their special incorporated culture is also expressed as their food.
Their main foods are wine, butter, cheese, and churrasco, which are known as famous foods for parties and gatherings. Churrasco is a traditional cuisine of Brazil in which the various ingredients, such as beef, pork, lamb, chicken, and pineapple are plugged into skewers and grilled over charcoal. Currently, Brazil’s economy is held by the White European people, but it is Black-centered in terms of culture. Due to this background, their food custom is derived from black slaves. Brazilian meals are salty and use a lot of olive oil because of the supplement of salinity and vegetable fats in a tropical country.
Brazilian music actually did not have a unique sound except for the folk music accompanied by samba dance which was affected by African culture. Samba, which was the most popular in the 1930s, is combined with Spain’s Bolero and African rhythm. Passionate Samba football is also famous in the world. All Brazilians are impassioned in the season of the World Cup and they are given an enthusiastic welcome to their victory full of streets. They will even throw their TV’s out of the window if they lose.
Cultural festivals are always colorful and delightful and are filled with racial and ethnic diversity. Coming in contact with other countries and cultures is important as much as concentrating on my own country and culture. Accepting and learning racial cultural diversity is the way to respect and comprehend myself and to show my culture to others. It becomes a war if we use weapons for conflicts of race, religion, or politics, and it becomes a festival if we use culture for singing, dancing, food, or language. Comfort and joy due to a sense of belonging and homogeneity are necessary in human society, and people confirm their identity and find pleasure through these cultural events. This is also the attractiveness of the United States of America where diversity is part of the country.
==================
Wolran Kim
November 2012
I went to the Brazilian Festival at the Gallivan Center Downtown last weekend on September 8th. When I arrived there, around 400~500 people were dancing the samba on the lawn between buildings. On the stage, many musicians were adding to the amusement of people by playing instruments, dancing, and singing. The music was full of fun and familiarity, and the people were really excited. Many of them were wearing yellow and green T-shirts, which are the colors of their national flag, so I felt as if I were in Brazil. I have never been to Brazil and the only things I know about this country is that they are famous for football and coffee. I know one Brazilian, who is my daughter’s boyfriend, and he speaks fluent Portuguese, besides English. Many booths lined the lawn, selling indigenous Brazilian products, and people were eating food on the tables.
The Utah Brazilian Festival started in 2005 and this event was held annually at Thanksgiving Point, Utah Valley University, Gateway Mall, or the Gallivan Center. The Festival began with a small group of friends eager to celebrate their heritage and share it with the community that embraced them and has since become a greatly anticipated tradition. There are no precise estimates of how many Brazilians and descendents live nowadays in Utah. They also had the fundraising dinner for the second time following last year and opened it to the public. Viva Brazil Cultural Center is a non-profit organization dedicated to educate the public about Brazilian arts, tradition, culture, and language. It also has the purpose to facilitate communication and cooperation among the Brazilian community within and outside the state of Utah and to provide educational assistance.
They had a Samba Parade, Samba Fogo (drummers and fire dancers), Capoeira Show, Sponsor’s Presentation, Dance Workshop, Roberto Trevisan (playing Forro style music), Marcio Mendes, and Mix Brazil Band as an all day event from 1 pm to 7 pm. Capoeira is a Brazilian martial art that combines elements of dance and music. It was created in Brazil mainly by descendants of African slaves with Brazilian native influences, probably beginning in the 16th century. It is known for its quick and complex moves, using mainly power, speed, and leverage for leg sweeps. The word capoeira refers to the areas of low vegetation in the Brazilian interior.
The people’s lives and emotions melted into their culture. Culture is often understood as the concept of race or ethnicity because culture is a synthesis of different lifestyles in each group. According to Franz Boas (1858-1942), culture is a system of shared beliefs, values, customs, behaviors, and artifacts that the members of a society use to cope with their world and with one another, and that are transmitted from generation to generation through learning. Therefore, cultural events are the best chance to learn and enjoy features, religion, food, music, and fashion of other countries at a glance.
According to one estimate, around 1.1 million Brazilians live in the United States and 300,000 of them live in Florida (2008). The official United States Census category of Hispanic or Latino is limited explicitly to people of "Spanish culture or origin," and therefore does not include Brazilian Americans. The first recorded Brazilians to immigrate to the United States came in the 1960s. Before then, Brazilians were included in a group formed by all South American groups. Many Brazilian immigrants in the United States are university-educated, however, have settled for lower-status jobs because of the language barrier. The majority—nearly 90 percent—of Brazilian Americans are Roman Catholic.
Brazil’s official name is República Federativa de Brasil/Federative Republic of Brazil, which counts for about half of the entire continent of South America, and has 187 million in population. The capital is Brasilia and it borders all South American countries except Ecuador and Chile. Their traditional culture is increasingly scrambled with many others, such as those from indigenous India, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, as well as Portugal, which influenced their language and religion. Brazil successfully created their own culture through an assimilation of complex mixed blood, compared with Latin America, which gathered all different races. Their special incorporated culture is also expressed as their food.
Their main foods are wine, butter, cheese, and churrasco, which are known as famous foods for parties and gatherings. Churrasco is a traditional cuisine of Brazil in which the various ingredients, such as beef, pork, lamb, chicken, and pineapple are plugged into skewers and grilled over charcoal. Currently, Brazil’s economy is held by the White European people, but it is Black-centered in terms of culture. Due to this background, their food custom is derived from black slaves. Brazilian meals are salty and use a lot of olive oil because of the supplement of salinity and vegetable fats in a tropical country.
Brazilian music actually did not have a unique sound except for the folk music accompanied by samba dance which was affected by African culture. Samba, which was the most popular in the 1930s, is combined with Spain’s Bolero and African rhythm. Passionate Samba football is also famous in the world. All Brazilians are impassioned in the season of the World Cup and they are given an enthusiastic welcome to their victory full of streets. They will even throw their TV’s out of the window if they lose.
Cultural festivals are always colorful and delightful and are filled with racial and ethnic diversity. Coming in contact with other countries and cultures is important as much as concentrating on my own country and culture. Accepting and learning racial cultural diversity is the way to respect and comprehend myself and to show my culture to others. It becomes a war if we use weapons for conflicts of race, religion, or politics, and it becomes a festival if we use culture for singing, dancing, food, or language. Comfort and joy due to a sense of belonging and homogeneity are necessary in human society, and people confirm their identity and find pleasure through these cultural events. This is also the attractiveness of the United States of America where diversity is part of the country.