Vol. 1 No. 28 (2023): African and Afrodiasporic Puppet Theater

In Africa there are about 490 different ethnicities, which produces a diversed overview between traditional, popular, contemporary and academic art. An example of this are the masks used in rituals, festivities and ceremonies, appreciated in metropolitan museums, and which have influenced the work of several western artists, in a complex movement that goes from inspiration to the theft of cultural heritage and appropriation.

The Puppet Theater of this immense continent has an incredible variety of forms, whether in a community dimension, itinerant or professionalized in festivals and events, which permeates both the traditional and the modern.

The influence of the cultures present on the African continent is immense and diverse all over the world, especially in Brazil, as it constitutes a cultural matrix.

We know that the colonial regimes were responsible for the flow of forced immigration by the slavery context that was established here from the 16th century on, and that, through culture, the enslaved were responsible for centuries of resistance that resonates until the present.

In this edition on African and Afrodiasporic Puppet Theater, we invite researchers and artists to write and share their studies and reflections about the influences, on the world scene, of this set of values, beliefs and ways of acting originating from African cultures.