“Quilombo is the possibility of humanizing the black bodies that colonialism tried to dehumanize.” It is this answer that historian Ana Paula Cruz, 34, gives to the question: what is a quilombo?
A doctor in history and school director, she was born in Santiago do Iguape, a quilombola community in Cachoeira, Bahia. The quilombos arose at the time of the Brazilian colonization in response to the violence of the Portuguese and their descendants against the blacks brought by force to Brazil from Africa. Records of the existence of quilombos date back to the 16th century. Quilombo dos Palmares was the most famous.
Black resistance in slavery, the quilombos suffer the inequalities left by the colonial era due to lack of access to land and public policies such as health and education.
In Brazil, 6,000 communities identify themselves as quilombos. Some already recognized. Others seek officialization. The northeast is home to the majority of the groups, 3,171, and the most regularized, 176.
The origin, the current reality and the struggle for land titling of the quilombos are little known in the country.
Translated by AZAHARA MARTIN ORTEGA
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