300 / Part Two: Last Born In Brazil

Let's proceed to part two. From December 2019 to February 2020, I was in Brazil. Without full comprehension, I (we) stood on the edge of a pandemic. The global scope of the crisis had yet to be fully felt and realized. Before "normal" ended. Before lockdowns, mask burnings, social isolation, uprising—I was in Brazil, with its complexities, beauties, intensities, realities. My time there left its mark on me, and is still felt to this day a year plus since—having informed almost every aspect of my life and work. It is certainly not lost on me that I had these experiences on the cusp of this pandemic. The importance of the work done there needed to be represented in this long episode; this is my attempt at doing so. In collaboration with Brazilian political theorist and journalist Mirna Wabi-Sabi, five interviews were conducted during my time there: two radical organizers (one an infamous political prisoner) of the More Love, Less Capital (Mais Amor, Menos Capital) event; a scholar, historian, and daughter of the African diasporic spiritual tradition Candomblé; a renowned photojournalist and activist documenting Indigenous resistance; a linguist and anthropologist conducting field work in Amazonia, working to preserve the dying languages of Indigenous communities. The section contains reflections on the calamitous realities of Brazil: the uprisings of 2013 and the state of the Left under neofascist Bolsonaro; the Western gaze on the Global South; the spiritual-social-political resistance of the African Diaspora; artistic representation of Indigenous struggle under Capital and the State; the subtle complexities of cultural genocide in Amazonia. // Timeline + sources: https://www.lastborninthewilderness.com/episodes/300-2 // Download: https://bit.ly/LBW300-2 // Sustain + support: https://www.patreon.com/lastborninthewilderness // Donate: https://www.paypal.me/lastbornpodcast