Community & Capoeira

Capoeira is an Afro-Brazilian martial art, involving elements of play, dance, music and fight. Much of the literature available to date surrounding Capoeira focusses on aspects of cultural sociology and not health per se. However, here, Capoeira well be used to explore mental health, well-being, and connectedness in a mutual sense through the delivery of a six-month Capoeira course in Birmingham. A mixed-methods approach comprising four elements:

1. pre-/post-course quantitative measure of social inclusion (Secker et al., 2009)
2. pre-/post-course quantitative measure of well-being (WEMBWS Tennant et al., 2007);
3. overt participant observation data from the classes;
4. semi-structured interviews towards the end of the course.

Data will be collected from the two participant groupings, Capoeira students and Capoeira teachers/‘Capoeiristas’, to explore connectedness and community.

Fieldwork Complete

This capoeira fieldwork has now been completed (February, 2015) and research team analysis has commenced. All seven members of the team are involved in the on-going coding and theme development. Two academic papers are planned alongside conference attendance and University of Nottingham presentations.

Project Start Date: Wednesday 1st January 2014 Project End Date: Saturday 31st December 2016

Dr Melanie Jordan
Asst Prof. in Criminology
Email: melanie.jordan@nottingham.ac.uk