Capoeira Life hosts free youth programs focused on self-expression, community, and respect

Based in South Seattle, Capoeira Life provide youth from under-resourced backgrounds access to the movement and music of Capoeira Angola. Their programs focus on physical and mental empowerment and instill respect, awareness, strength, and agility in their students. Through a combination of alternative curricula including both ancient traditions and modern Capoeira techniques, the organization aims to ensure that this sacred element of African-Brazilian culture survives for generations to come.

We recently connected with program coordinators from Capoeira Life to learn more about their programs and how they are using their Neighborhoods Matching Fund grant to help support community.

Can you tell me a bit about Capoeira Life and your mission?

Capoeira Life is a non-profit group dedicated to using Capoeira Angola to empower individuals in our diverse community, particularly youth from under-resourced backgrounds, in South Seattle. We are fiscally sponsored by Shunpike Arts Collective. It officially became an organization in 2014, but the non-profit mission and work has been ongoing - the founder, Syed Taqi, began teaching capoeira to the community in 2000.

In case folks don't know, can you explain what Capoeira is?

Originating as an African-Brazilian martial art form, Capoeira was created by enslaved Africans in Brazil as a means of self-defense, resistance, and cultural expression. Sometimes we call it "African Karate" to teach people quickly what it is like, but it is so much more. It's a harmonious blend of martial arts, dance, acrobatics, traditional music, and a strong sense of community and Portuguese language learning.

We maintain the tradition through the Capoeira Roda (pronounced "ho-da"), the circular gathering, where capoeira skills are applied. To illustrate the capoeira roda, around the head of the circle are the music instrument players, each instrument with a specific position and role to maintain the energy of the roda. The roda starts with the leading berimbau instrument player singing a praise to honor the elders. Two players from the roda "audience" start the opening game. They shake hands in respect and enter together to engage in non-contact capoeira movements with the flow of the music beat. Inverted movements like playful cartwheels and handstands movements connect one to the spirit world and bring out one's child/inner self. Participants outside the circle engage with clapping, singing, and being a part of the evolving energy.

In the roda, capoeiristas "play" their unique capoeira styles, communicating with moves, instrument rhythms, and song lyrics, conjuring/influencing the roda's energy. Specific rhythms are taught to guide the energy/axè with specific intentions and vibrations. Song lyrics tell stories and history, sending messages of intention to roda's energy. Modern artists write and deliver their own lyrics with their own rhythmic creations.

The roda is a sacred space for self-expression and a metaphor for the realities and hardships in life. Capoeira Grand Masters have taught for generations, "capoeira na roda, capoeira na vida," meaning: capoeira in the roda is a reflection of capoeira in life, and our life lessons inevitably surface in the roda. We cannot forget that capoeira was birthed from the yin and yang of resistance/survival and violence - that dichotomy is constantly in existence at all levels - physical, mental, and emotional - within and outside of ourselves. We need to let capoeira empower us to prepare to face each lesson of violence, not avoid it.

How will the funding from the Neighborhood Matching Fund (NMF) support your project?

The NMF funds will support one year of free weekly and monthly capoeira programs and other free events for youth, teens, and families including classes and community rodas. The grant will help pay capoeira artists for their time and for supplies for these events.

Our group is led by the diverse and marginalized South Seattle and greater Seattle communities we serve and empower through Capoeira Angola. Our programs benefit 100's of youth and family members.

Why are programs and events like this so important, especially for youth?

Our Capoeira program for kids revolves around key principles: focus, discipline, respect, achievement, community, and leadership. It's more than just an extracurricular activity; it's an exploration of cultural heritage and self-empowerment. Children experience the thrill of unique, dynamic movements while imbibing timeless values that will shape them into mindful and spirited individuals.

As students embrace the techniques, they also immerse themselves in a profound appreciation for the ancestors, customs, and masters of Capoeira. This journey of self-discovery underscores how the dedication you pour into Capoeira is directly proportional to the growth and potential you unlock within yourself.

Controlling emotions, maintaining respect for one another, and learning to express oneself creatively all together are some of the biggest lessons for capoeira and for building community. The lessons inside the roda inspire and empower each participant to connect in their own unique way. As participants watch and engage, they see and experience the challenges, the ups and downs of balancing one's energy physically, mentally, and spiritually. This intimate engagement is meant to be playful, creative, attentive, and cooperative. Capoeira's nature of self-expression strengthens the mental, physical, and spiritual self to counter life's challenges and inequities.

How do these programs help build and serve community?

These programs benefit the community by providing regular rich and engaging cultural art experiences of Capoeira Angola that build and nurture the vibrancy and vitality of the South Seattle community neighborhoods. All are welcome, and outreach will be focused on youth and families of underserved communities.

Capoeira's foundation is rooted in strengthening the physical, mental, spiritual health of marginalized peoples to disarm class/racial barriers. Capoeira was born in resistance to oppression that European colonizers during the times of slavery in Brazil imposed upon mostly captive Africans but also aboriginal peoples and other Europeans forced into militaries. These diverse peoples built freedom settlements in mountains and created capoeira to escape/defend from European colonizers. Capoeira's holistic by-the-people-for-the-people nature and its transformational power embody social equity and health wellness.

Our community is a representation of capoeira - we are for and by the diverse marginalized peoples of our neighborhoods. Our artists, leaders, members, visitors and audiences are a collective of BIPOC, LGBTQ+, persons living with disabilities, refugee, immigrant, womxn, and low-income earners, doing the work to uplift ourselves and each other.

Especially today, our diverse communities face trauma and challenges of simply being human. Physical and mental health suffers. Filling our community's needs, Capoeira is a solution incorporating dynamic elements for anyone to face themselves, to express, and to heal through their unique abilities, disabilities, differences, hardships, and gifts. Capoeira elements readily apply to physical/mental/spiritual/societal struggles. Whether a new mindset, language, song, rhythm, or way to move, through its elements, capoeira sees people of our community and provides a medium to create in and an interconnectedness to become a part of.

Capoeira rodas bring together diverse groups of individuals of all ages, physical abilities, identities, and from a wide array of backgrounds. Each of the movements performed in capoeira is taught to encourage self-inspired movement (personal style) to accommodate various body types, abilities, and personalities. Individuals with limited mobility can still participate in music, and each person in attendance contributes axé/energy to the roda, be it in the form of movement, singing, clapping, or their presence.

The engaging nature, the lessons in history, and the real-life application of the lessons are all a part of a dynamic plan to build and represent our diverse community through capoeira

Capoeira can feel scary and intimidating - unfamiliar faces, sometimes many, sometimes few, foreign language, challenging and at times childlike movements, new music instruments, different yet relatable and relevant history - but if we focus on ourselves in capoeira, we actually each bring something unique and amazing to capoeira and the roda that we can then apply to our own challenges in life. By maintaining the tradition, we aim for our community to grow in this way. We hope more and more of Seattle will participate in the various capoeira movements around the city to build a network of capoeira culture and community empowerment.

Public link

Please use the above public link if you want to share this noodl on another website.