Moving Through Deserts: Trails Of Being Among Maroons In Goiás

Abstract

In this article, I explore the semantic variations of the notion of desert, and its relation to territory and movement among the maroon community ‘Família Magalhães’ (Nova Roma, Goias, Brazil). This community descends from the Kalunga, who were a large group of enslaved people hiding in the valleys of the Paranã river between the 17th and 19th centuries. Difficult access to this region ensured that the Kalunga could live and thrive as free men and women. Although people now living in the town of Nova Roma say that it lacks everything, and that the whole region is fading into a desert, the Magalhães are able to extract its creative potency. It is under the shadow of this seemly inescapable desert that the Magalhães wander through their trails along the Paranã river, cultivate relationships in the neighborhood, and intervene in public policies concerning their land. They constantly produce themselves as an “amigueiro” (friendly) people, but always in relation to the desert that is and ought to be. For the Magalhães, cultivating friendships is a necessary condition for leaving the desert, but, at the same time, the desret is necessary for their way of being.