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Directed by Aurélio Prates and Kelwin Marques, the short is the first editing exercise based on images taken in São Paulo and Recife. In the royal processions of the Nations of Maracatu, in the middle of the 20th century, the figure of the Baiana began to be occupied by transvestites, chickens, and other bodies for which femininity was not presupposed. The film seeks to present the relationship of the Bahianas Ricas do maracatu with their ancestries, which can occur both from the memory of the older Bahian women, as well as from contact with more-than-human females such as the Yabás, the Mestras de Jurema, Pombagiras, etc.

Kelwin is a master's student in Social Anthropology at the University of São Paulo (USP), supervised by professor Sylvia Caiuby Novaes, and a researcher at the Visual Anthropology Group (GRAVI). He has experience in the areas of photography, visual anthropology, anthropology of Afro-Brazilian populations and ethnomusicology.

The award event takes place between November 11th and 14th, 2024 as part of the John Monteiro Anthropology Journeys at the State University of Campinas (UNICAMP).

In the 2024 edition, the Journal of Audiovisual Ethnomusicology (JAVEM) magazine presents a curation of five films that explore the multisensory dimensions of the interaction between music, culture and multimedia, in addition to standing out for the search for interactive methodologies, the exploration of sensory experiences and of the complex socio-political worlds in which music is present. Among the selected works, the new edition of JAVEM features two productions carried out by researchers from the Musical Anthropology Research Group (PAM) at the University of São Paulo (USP).

Open Gasy presents the challenges a Malagasy musician faces in the French World Music scene, the complexities of the work, the need for adaptation and the complexities of musical authenticity. Directed by Yuri Prado, the film is available on the website of the USP Image and Sound in Anthropology Laboratory (LISA). Yuri Prado is a postdoctoral student in Social Anthropology at USP, supervised by professor Rose Satiko Hikiji, having completed a research internship at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), in Paris. Graduated in Music (Composition) from the Department of Music at USP, he has a Direct Doctorate from the same institution, with a research internship in ethnomusicology at Université Paris VIII.

The film Toré, directed by Alice Villela, presents a visceral experience of spiritual and community practices, working on the role of indigenous cultural identity and its resistance strategies through musicality and dance and the strengthening of community ties. Alice Villela completed her post-doctorate in Social Anthropology at USP, also supervised by Professor Rose Satiko. He worked for more than ten years with the Asuriní people of Xingu, in Pará, developing master's and doctoral research on image and shamanism. Currently, he is carrying out research linked to the struggle for land and the music of the Kariri-Xocó, an indigenous people from Alagoas. Researcher and director of documentary films with indigenous peoples, she works as a collaborator at the Cisco Laboratory, having directed several documentaries such as Acontecências (2009), Toré (2022) and Na Volta do Mundo (2022).

Based at LISA, since 2011, PAM has been dedicated to studying the dialogues between anthropology and music within the scope of the research line “Expressive Forms and Regimes of Knowledge” of the Department of Anthropology at USP. The line of research deals with the relationships involved in different regimes of knowledge production and aesthetic expression.

From October 3rd to 7th, 2024, the University of São Paulo (USP) and the University of Campinas (UNICAMP) hosted the "International Study Symposium - The Techniques of the Body: 90 Years of Marcel Mauss’s Essay."

Coordinated by Guilherme Moura Fagundes, professor at USP's Department of Anthropology (DA) and vice-coordinator of the Laboratory of Image and Sound in Anthropology (LISA), along with Rafael Antunes Almeida from the University for International Integration of the Afro-Brazilian Lusophony (UNILAB), the event marked 90 years since the publication of Marcel Mauss’s renowned essay "The Techniques of the Body." It also saw the launch of the Anthropology, Environment, and Biotechnodiversity Collective (CHAMA), a study group at USP's Department of Anthropology led by Professor Guilherme Moura Fagundes.

The symposium featured three prominent specialists on the "technological" dimension of Mauss's work—focusing literally on the study of technique: Perig Pitrou, researcher at CNRS and director of the Maison Française d'Oxford research center; Carlos Sautchuk, coordinator of the Laboratory of Anthropology of Science and Technology at the University of Brasília (LACT/UnB); and Nathan Schlanger from the École Nationale des Chartes (ENC, Paris).

Discussions compared how Mauss's essay has been received and its effects on the consolidation of the anthropology of technology in Brazil and France. This field of study seeks to understand technical phenomena from a symmetrical perspective, overcoming the dichotomy between modern and traditional societies, while addressing interactions between humans and non-humans in life-making activities. These insights are central to addressing our current ecological crisis, where human actions on the planet are often reduced to ideas like "nature's destruction" or "domination of living beings," overshadowing the paleontological continuity between technical and vital phenomena.

The first session of the symposium, hosted in the LISA auditorium, was titled "Life and Movement: Impacts and Perspectives of Body Techniques Between Brazil and France." It opened with remarks from Professor Guilherme Moura Fagundes, was moderated by Rafael Almeida, and included presentations by Carlos Sautchuk and Perig Pitrou. The session aimed to show how Marcel Mauss's essay condenses various inflections of his thought, particularly regarding materiality and the vital dimension in shaping social life, offering a research agenda that resonates with contemporary critiques of the nature-culture divide.

In addition to the opening panel, the symposium featured three lectures by Professor Nathan Schlanger. The first, titled "Techniques of the Body and Technical Bodies—Marcel Mauss on Industry and Craft," was delivered in French with simultaneous translation and moderated by Professor Guilherme Moura Fagundes. It drew on archival materials by Marcel Mauss to provide intellectual and institutional details about the context in which his thoughts on technique emerged. The second lecture, given in English and titled "André Leroi-Gourhan: From Material Civilizations to Technical Behavior," was moderated by Eduardo Neves (MAE/USP) and focused on Schlanger’s recent book about ethnologist and archaeologist André Leroi-Gourhan (1911-1986), a student of Mauss and contemporary of Claude Lévi-Strauss at the Collège de France. The final lecture addressed "Learning in the Paleolithic: Technical Gestures, Operational Chains, and Skill-Building in Prehistory," presented by Joana Cabral (IFCH/Unicamp) with moderation and translation by Chantal Medaets (FE/Unicamp).

The symposium was organized by the Anthropology, Environment, and Biotechnodiversity Collective at USP (CHAMA), the Laboratory of Anthropology of Science and Technology at UnB (LACT), and the French Consulate in São Paulo. In addition to LISA, the event was supported by the Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology (MAE-USP), the Graduate Program in Social Anthropology at USP (PPGAS-USP), and the Graduate Program in Social Anthropology at UNICAMP (PPGAS-Unicamp).

To view the event’s full program, visit the LISA website: https://lisa.fflch.usp.br/node/13058. Recordings of the symposium sessions are available on CHAMA’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@Chama-USP. To learn more about the essay "The Techniques of the Body," visit USP’s Anthropology Encyclopedia: https://ea.fflch.usp.br/obra/tecnicas-do-corpo.