Abstract

GUIMARAES, Roberta Sampaio. Entre vulgarizações e singularizações: notas sobre a vida social dos balaios. Horiz. antropol. [online]. 2011, vol.17, n.36, pp. 127-143. ISSN 0104-7183.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S0104-71832011000200006.

Starting from a general reflection on the study of "material culture", in this article I experiment the analytic profitability of the theoretical formulations of Igor Kopytoff, author who suggested a research of the cultural biography of the objects, emphasizing their life stages and the gradations, overlaps and recurrences of classifications that cause their vulgarization or singularization in a given society. And searching a creative dialogue with this author, I use notes taken during a fieldwork with members of the carnival group Afoxé Filhos de Gandhi of Rio de Janeiro, composed of practitioners of Candomble and who used ritually "baskets" during a religious procession in the streets of the city named Yemanja's Gift.

Keywords : baskets; biography; material culture; Yemanja's Gift.