THE NATION THROUGH BANTU EXPERIENCE

PATHWAYS TOWARD A MEETING PLACE OF NATIONS

Abstract

This text seeks to present a discussion of the concept of nation, based on the experience of Angolan candomblé in Salvador. We start from dialogues between authors who have also considered this question, and who are practitioners of Angolan candomblé, in addition to being scholars of Afro-Brazilian religions. We will ground ourselves in a provocation of the concept of nation mobilized by the Modern Nation State. Throughout the text, the voices of the author appear conjugated in the first person, but also in the third person plural. We will make use of ideas such as heterarchy and Bantu hospitality, in addition to the writings of Kia Bunseki Fu-Kiau (1991) to outline an understanding of nation as a place to be entered and explored. In this sense, we arrive at a framework, inspired by the writings of Makota Valdina, which proposes an understanding of the Angolan nation as forged by relations of confluence (Santos, 2015) and as characterized by the need to recognize and respect the multiple origins of Afro-Brazilians. Based on our reading of the Bantu world, we present the argument that at the meeting point of nations there will be room for everything and everyone.