Abstract
What is slavery? Is it possible to identify it in contexts where it was legally abolished? To answer these questions, the article analyzes the uses of slavery as an interpretative framework, created from a popular culture rite, which gives meaning to experiences of exploitation and deprivation lived at work. This framework makes it possible to recognize contemporary forms of slavery foreseen in national legislation and to identify others that are not covered. Based on ethnographic research on the congados mineiros, the analysis offers an anthropological contribution to studies of the constitutive elements of slavery and its legal definitions. It presents possibilities for better adapting these legal devices to the circumstances in which they operate, suggesting ways of translating them in terms of those who perceive their working conditions, or those of the social segment to which they belong, as associated with slavery.
Keywords:
Contemporary Slavery; Captivity; Frame; Debt; Control