Sport, Education and Society

ISSN: (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cses20

African and Indigenous games and activities: a

pilot study on their legitimacy and complexity in
Brazilian physical education teaching

Arliene Stephanie Menezes Pereira & Luciana Venâncio

To cite this article: Arliene Stephanie Menezes Pereira & Luciana Venâncio (2021) African
and Indigenous games and activities: a pilot study on their legitimacy and complexity in
Brazilian physical education teaching, Sport, Education and Society, 26:7, 718-732, DOI:
10.1080/13573322.2021.1902298

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2021.1902298

Published online: 23 Mar 2021.

Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 538

View related articles

View Crossmark data

Citing articles: 3 View citing articles

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at

https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=cses20
SPORT, EDUCATION AND SOCIETY
2021, VOL. 26, NO. 7, 718–732
https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2021.1902298

African and Indigenous games and activities: a pilot study on

their legitimacy and complexity in Brazilian physical education
teaching
a b,c
Arliene Stephanie Menezes Pereira and Luciana Venâncio
a
Federal Institute of Education, Science and Technology of Ceará, Paracuru, Brazil; bInstitute of Physical Education
and Sports, Federal University of Ceará, Fortaleza, Brazil; cPhysical Education Post-Graduate Programme, Federal
University of Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brazil

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

Although the teaching of African-Brazilian and Indigenous history and Received 9 March 2020
culture is mandatory in primary and secondary schools, there has been Accepted 9 March 2021
a lack of proper contextualizing in PETE programs [Corsino, L. N., &
KEYWORDS
Conceição, W. L. (Eds.). (2016). Educação física escolar e relações étnico- physical education teacher
raciais: Subsídios para a implementação das leis 10.639-03 e 11.645-08 education (PETE); ethnic-
[School physical education and ethnic-racial relations: Subsidies for the racial issues; school physical
implementation of laws 10.639-03 and 11.645-08]. CRV, v. 11]. There is education; educational laws;
also a need to study how the recognition of African-Brazilian and African and Indigenous
Indigenous ethnic-racial issues in primary and secondary physical games and activities
education is mandated by the law. The purpose of this research –
framed as a pilot study – is to address the invisibility of African-Brazilian
and Indigenous history and culture in schools. The objective is to
analyze both the teachers’ knowledge and the law application in
physical education classes concerning African and Indigenous games
and activities. We have addressed the invisibility of Black and
Indigenous people in Brazil, connections to the African diasporas and
Indigenous cultures, ethnic-racial inequalities in physical education, and
the African-Brazilian and Indigenous complexities as challenges for
PETE. The research method is qualitatively oriented and descriptive.
Data was generated from an online questionnaire responded to by
physical education teachers who work in primary schools. Findings
suggest that there is a lack of discussion on ethnic-racial issues in PETE
or in permanent teacher education programs. Despite the law, there is a
discrepancy in its application in Brazilian education. Physical education
opens space to reflect upon the African-Brazilian and Indigenous
cultures in the schools. Even teachers who do not teach ethnic-racial
issues at their schools affirm the importance to teach. In conclusion, it is
necessary to decolonize the curriculum, emphasizing the ethnic-racial
complexity in PETE. Transform pedagogies and prompt the construction
of new paths for social justice practices do require a more culturally
diverse physical education curriculum.

Introduction
The demographic mix of Brazil’s population reflects not only a history of colonization, racial discrimi-
nation and oppression that needs to be addressed through education, but also a richness and

CONTACT Luciana Venâncio luvenancio@ufc.br Institute of Physical Education and Sports, Federal University of Ceará,
Av. Mister Hull, Parque Esportivo, Bloco 320 campus do Pici, Fortaleza, Ceará, 60455-760, Brazil; Physical Education Post-Graduate
Programme, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brazil
This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.
© 2021 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
 SPORT, EDUCATION AND SOCIETY 719

diversity of cultures that provide fertile grounds for learning about the cultural heritage, customs
and belief systems of Brazil’s many peoples. Brazil has the largest Black1 population in the world
outside of the African continent and a large Indigenous population, estimated to represent 300
different ethnicities, with many facing extinction and loss of their traditional lands and culture
(Ricardo & Ricardo, 2017). When added to those who count themselves as multiracial, more than
50% of Brazil’s population of 211 million can be regarded as Black. However, despite laws aimed
at encouraging schools to be fully inclusive in their curriculum offerings, few schools and teachers
do this effectively. With respect to physical education in particular, these populations become invis-
ible and the opportunity to enrich the curriculum is lost. In considering why this is the case, one of
the strong arguments offered is that physical education teachers are not critically educated about
the culture, history and issues of Black and Indigenous2 peoples in Brazil through their physical edu-
cation teacher education (PETE) programs (Nobrega, 2020; Pereira, 2020; Venâncio & Nóbrega, 2020).
Given that the law emphasizes the teaching of embodied legacies from African and Indigenous cul-
tures, this study seeks to understand why this may be the case by examining teachers’ perspectives
on teaching African and Indigenous games and activities in physical education, and consider the
implications for PETE.
The invisibility of ethnic-racial issues is aligned with the precarity of neoliberalism and its reper-
cussions in physical education (Kirk, 2020). Over the past two decades, global forums have explicitly
addressed issues such as prejudice, racism, xenophobia, and other forms of intolerance. These efforts
have defined policies both locally and globally to address the social ills caused by those forms of
oppression (Anunciação et al., 2020; Cavalleiro, 2001; Nelson, 2012). Despite the global recognition
of racism as problematic within educational and political contexts, there has been a lack of recog-
nition specific to inequities faced by Black and Indigenous peoples. Furthermore, as many have
argued, the myth of racial equality is false (Lovell, 2000). The experience and view of those who
live under – and are aware of – such oppression is that Brazil is a racist country, and many share
the concern that current right-wing policies are aimed at fostering hate towards ethnic diversity
(Souza, 2018, 2019). In multiple ways, this ends up affecting Brazilian education and PETE (Ferraz
et al., 2020; Sanches Neto et al., 2020; Santos et al., 2020; Tani et al., 2020).
Regarding our own positionality as researchers, we are Black women who work collaboratively
from within a collective of physical education teacher educators and researchers committed to Indi-
genous and African-descent causes. We teach and research the beliefs and practices of physical edu-
cation teachers in the city of Fortaleza, the capital city of the State of Ceará in the Northeast of Brazil.
Our aim is to challenge current practices that make ethnic-racial issues invisible within the physical
education curriculum, support teachers to enact a critical pedagogy sensitive to issues of ethnicity
and race, contribute to enacting anti-racist and anti-colonizing pedagogies within our own PETE pro-
grams, and deepen our own understandings of ways to theorize and research ethnic-racial issues as
they emerge within contemporary education. In this paper, our objective is to analyze physical edu-
cation teachers’ perspectives on including and teaching African and Indigenous games and activities
as part of their school physical education curriculum. The two research questions are:

(1) What do physical education teachers know about their legal obligations in respect to teaching
ethnic-racial issues?
(2) What are their perspectives and practices in respect to teaching African and Indigenous games
and activities?

At the outset, it is important to point out that this study is not about the education of Quilombo-
las3, or about the specific schools for such populations. Our focus is on the African-Brazilian and Indi-
genous issues in Brazilian physical education (Corsino & Conceição, 2016). To accomplish this
objective, we begin by providing legal context for the basic education of all Brazilians regarding
the African-Brazilian and Indigenous cultures in the country. In our literature review and conceptual
framework, we will discuss how African-Brazilian and Indigenous ethnic-racial issues are approached
720 A. S. M. PEREIRA AND L. VENÂNCIO

in Brazilian physical education. Firstly, we are going to address the invisibility of Black and Indigen-
ous peoples in Brazil and approach the connections to the African diaspora and Indigenous cultures.
Secondly, we are going to address the ethnic-racial inequalities in physical education and approach
the African-Brazilian and Indigenous complexities as challenges for PETE. Then, we present the meth-
odology and how the analysis has proceeded. Next, we describe and discuss the findings considering
the literature. Afterwards we detail the correspondence – representation or misrepresentation –
between our findings and the two research questions.

African-Brazilian diaspora and Indigenous cultures – ‘We created Quilombos and here is
Amefrica’
There are convergences and intersections between Black and Indigenous peoples in their fights for
recognition against invisibility in Brazil (Bedeschi, 2008; Cabalzar, 2012). However, for this paper,
there is a need to acknowledge the enormous impact of enslavement. As Span and Sanya (2019)
note, ‘In the four hundred years of the transatlantic slave trade, nearly 40 percent of all Africans
sold into slavery were displaced to Brazil’ (p. 402). In their attempt to acknowledge this history,
the General Assembly of the United Nations Organization (UNO) proclaimed the period between
2015 and 2024 as the international decade of African descendants, highlighting and recognizing
that the human rights of these distinctive groups must be promoted and preserved.
Either as the descendants of the transatlantic slave traffic victims or the more recent migrants, this people con-
stitute some of the most marginalized and poorest groups. International and National studies and research
demonstrate that African descendants still have limited access to quality education, health services, housing
and safety. In many cases, the situation remains practically invisible and insufficient recognition is given concern-
ing the effort of African ancestry in order to look for compensation for its current condition. They are all often
victims of justice discrimination and face alarming indices of police violence and racial discrimination. In
addition, their degree of political participation is low, either in voting or in political positions. Further, African
descendants can suffer multiple forms of discrimination based on other related criteria such as age, gender,
language, religion, political opinion, social status, incapacity, origin, among others. African descendants’
Human Rights protection and promotion have been prioritized by the UNO. The Durban declaration and the
Action Program recognize that African descendants were victims of slavery, traffic and colonialism, and are
still victims of their consequences. (UNO, 2019)

Socioeconomic indicators, such as those outlined above, highlight the limited access to quality edu-
cation, health services, housing, and safety, that are often real-life experience for Black and Indigen-
ous peoples in Brazil. These populations are marginalized, socially vulnerable, and victims of
discrimination. Where education has been used as a means of emancipation for Black populations
throughout the African diaspora (Span & Sanya, 2019), in Brazil this opportunity is structurally pre-
vented (Almeida, 2018; Anunciação et al., 2020; Kilomba, 2019). The African-Brazilian diasporic
experience has created organic ways of living together in the Quilombos and many cultural elements,
such as Capoeira (Santos, 2015). Each Quilombo is a traditional community of African ancestry with
specific legislation, education, and schooling. The Quilombos have been places of resistance for cen-
turies – still now – based on the African ancestry. The sense of belonging lived in the Quilombos have
developed and shaped what Gonzalez (1988) called Amefrica, which is the Black peoples’ experience
of living freely as Africans in the Americas. Amefrica – as the collective experience of togetherness
from all Quilombos – is the most relevant epistemological heritage of the African diasporas in all
regions of Brazil and in the American continent (Gonzalez, 1988).

Black and Indigenous peoples in Brazil – ‘We are not invisible … We have never been’
To address these inequalities, we must discuss the political context that frames Brazilian education.
Perhaps the most significant political initiatives to highlight were the two specific laws passed by the
government of the former President, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva – identified numerically as 10,639
(Brasil, 2003a) and 11,645 (Brasil, 2008). Both laws are considered as milestones in Brazilian
 SPORT, EDUCATION AND SOCIETY 721

education, since through them schools and their agents became protagonists in the appreciation of
the country’s ethnic-racial diversity. As Corsino and Conceição (2016) explain,
These laws seek to attend to the need of building an equalitarian education, promoting possible pedagogical
measures which deconstruct the engendered and established truths within the official curriculum, syllabuses,
textbooks and the practices ongoing in the school’s everyday life through discourses based on a colonizing per-
spective which reproduces a European, heteronormative, elitist and adult-centered worldview. (p. 7)

As intended, these laws had profound implications and changed the guidelines of Brazilian edu-
cation (Brasil, 1996), including setting in place the expectation for the teaching of African-Brazilian
and Indigenous history and culture in all primary and secondary schools. In addition to these
laws, the former President also established the Secretary of Racial Equality Promotion Policies
(SEPPIR) in March 2003 through a provisory measure later converted into the Law 10,678, which:
[…] is born from the recognition of historical fights of the Black Brazilian Movement. The date is emblematic,
since the whole world celebrated the International Day of the Racial Discrimination Elimination, instituted by
the UNO, in memory of the Sharpeville massacre. On March 21st of 1960, 20,000 Black people protested
against the Law of Passing, which obligated them to carry their ID cards, specifying the places where they
could circle. This happened in the city of Johannesburg, in South Africa. Even in a pacifist protest, the army
shot the crowd, killing 69 and injuring 186 people. (Brasil, 2003b)

The establishment of the SEPPIR emerged from the need to address ethnic-racial issues that had
been the subject of much advocacy and discussions. In 2004, two documents – the National Curri-
cular Guidelines for the Education of Ethnic-Racial Relationships (ERER) and for the African-Brazilian
History and Culture Teaching (Brasil, 2004) and the Actions and Orientations for the ERER (Brasil,
2006) – were published. The documents highlighted the actions and measures that either had
been implemented or needed to be implemented in the school curriculum. The ERER – its back-
ground and specific legislation – is the conceptual framework of our research. Its aim has been
about ‘objectifying injustices correction, eliminating discrimination and promoting social inclusion
and citizenship for the whole Brazilian educational system’ (Brasil, 2004, p. 5). The ERER guidelines
outline the expectation that regional authorities responsible for education in their area to instruct
and promote teacher education and supervise its execution (Brasil, 2004). What was so profound
about these initiatives was the fact that, since the first European invasions in 1500, this was the
first time that any legislation recognized ethnic-racial inequalities in the Brazilian society as a coun-
terpoint to the myth of racial democracy. For over 500 years, Black and Indigenous peoples were
invisible as if their lives and needs simply did not matter in terms of public policies (Sanches Neto
& Venâncio, 2020).
In August 2014, the former President Dilma Vana Rousseff sanctioned the Law 12,711, known as
the Quotas Act in the universities. This law amplified social justice providing more educational
opportunities in the country, constituting a pioneer legislation which significantly changed the
reduction of social inequality in Brazil though democratization of higher education. This law
addresses students who fully completed their secondary education in the public system, coming
from a low-income family, and self-declaring themselves as Black, Brown or Indigenous, reserving
at least 50% of the vacancies in the top-ranked federal universities and institutes. Later, the
former President Dilma Vana Rousseff promulgated Law 12,990 (Brasil, 2014), reserving 20% of
the vacancies offered in all public assessments to Black people in order to provide effective job pos-
itions in the federal administration.
As mentioned previously, these laws and other related initiatives were the result of political and
social struggles from the Black and Indigenous movements, especially in the second half of the twen-
tieth century. They also resulted from international pressure and ‘the agreements assumed in inter-
national conferences by the Brazilian State, among other bodies’ (Brasil, 2006, pp. 127–128).
However, Brazil’s politics has always been highly polarized and in 2018 the government moved sig-
nificantly from its leftist orientation to one very much grounded in rightist politics. As a result, not
only the current government are seeking to ignore the aspirations of previous laws and work against
722 A. S. M. PEREIRA AND L. VENÂNCIO

ethnic-racial diversity but are also actively undermining the traditional allocation of land to Indigen-
ous communities (Carneiro Filho & Souza, 2009). In addition, the discourse used by the current Bra-
zilian President, Jair Messias Bolsonaro, often represents what can be termed ‘hate speech’ in the way
he defends the implementation of new policies. This changed political discourse and context is
addressed in the next section.

Addressing ethnic-racial inequities in physical education – ‘Is the President against the
law?’
Brazilian politics does not match the UNO’s international aspirations for the Black and Indigenous
populations. On the contrary, it sets the law against them. The extreme right-wing President Jair
Messias Bolsonaro has been disseminating hate speeches during official announcements – for
three decades – since he was a Federal Deputy (Sanches Neto & Venâncio, 2020). In addition, the
President said that Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) encourage Indigenous peoples to
enter into conflict and that there would be no demarcation of Indigenous lands in his government.
These hateful speeches by the president culminated in the death of a Capoeira Master – known as
Moa from Katendê – who was killed in 2018 by another Brazilian who supported the racist content of
the speech, because Moa was contrary to the current government. As Capoeira is associated with the
physical education curriculum making there are constraints to its teaching. Parallel to the racist
movements towards the Black population, intense attacks were delivered against the Indigenous
communities in several native lands around the country after the President’s term beginning in
January 2019, not worried about social justice. Therefore, it is important to highlight that Brazil’s
reality is due to the heritage of the long European colonization period and the fact that Brazil
was the last country to abolish slavery in 1888. For Sanches Neto and Oyama (1999), such reality
implies the lack of concern about Black and Indigenous ethnic-racial issues in Brazilian physical
education.
Concerning Brazilian PETE, the current political context is demoralizing and has ongoing decon-
struction of rights, as recently argued by Knijnik and Luguetti (2020) and Sanches Neto et al. (2020).
For Sousa (2019), it is necessary to re-establish the dialogue between Paulo Freire’s educational
thoughts and the Black peoples’ needs – such as in the critical perspective of Frantz Fanon –
because ‘the oppressor is not satisfied with the objective inexistence of the oppressed culture;
the efforts are for the colonized confess the inferiority of their culture once transformed in instinctive
conducts’ (Sousa, 2019, p. 146).
As we write this paper, Brazilian education is suffering an unprecedented attack. In addition to an increase of
funding withdrawal for public education which threatens the very existence of public schools and universities,
right-wing political parties and movements have been making persistent attempts to demonize teachers and
teaching. Their educational policies and practices are based on an eradication of Freirean ideas and any critical
thinking from Brazilian schools. For example, teachers who teach anything related to gender, social justice or
diversity are being filmed and harassed online by the “anti-Freirean” patrols. Teachers and teacher educators
feel that they do not have any power to deliver their classes without risking their professional positions.
(Knijnik & Luguetti, 2020, p. 11)

Brazil has a huge population of African ancestry (over 50%), but they are underrepresented as in
other countries. For instance, in the United States of America only 15% of the school-aged popu-
lation identify as Black (Walton-Fisette et al., 2019). What can be foreseen from the current political
status is that the schools and universities will have a bigger responsibility regarding physical edu-
cation committed to teaching ethnic-racial issues and PETE programs linked to the Laws 10,639
and 11,645. However, there are obstacles related to interpretation and effectiveness, such as the
lack of inspection of the law application. In the following section, we address the complexity of
African-Brazilian and Indigenous issues in PETE. We provide an overview of how the ethnic-racial
relations underlie Brazilian physical education and some paths that we can follow for teacher
education.
 SPORT, EDUCATION AND SOCIETY 723

African-Brazilian and Indigenous complexities as challenges to PETE – ‘Anti-racism

and social justice’
Brazil’s pseudo-racial democracy (Munanga, 2005) masks prejudice, religious intolerance, and the
deficiency of the university to incorporate ethnic-racial issues into its PETE programs. There is resist-
ance of many teacher educators and physical education teachers who seem to ignore the relation-
ship of their teaching subjects to the African-Brazilian and Indigenous issues. Or still, who are not
able or obliged to incorporate the laws. Regarding the ERER, what can commonly be seen are punc-
tual intramurals actions in the school body on allusive days – for instance, the Indigenous Day,
Slavery Abolition Day or Black Awareness Week – becoming superficial actions attached to colonial-
ism. Those actions devalue the African-Brazilian and Indigenous cultures, often treated as folkloric
stereotypes with no specificities. On the one hand, the European culture permeates through the
whole Brazilian education curriculum in its subjects and different levels without the need of any
specific law. On the other hand, the Black and Indigenous cultures needed a specific law, and
even so are not represented or applied in its totality.
Addressing the specific legislation in teacher education programs connects to the understanding
that ‘practices are still rare experiences, many times isolated and with no deployment in the insti-
tutional scope, meaning solitary actions of few educators, mostly Black educators’ (Sant’Ana,
2005, p. 128). Noteworthy, applying the law in PETE is slower than expected (Pereira et al., 2019).
All teachers declared not having received any type of pedagogical orientation about the racial issues in Brazil,
neither in their teacher education courses nor the schools where they teach or taught. Thus, pedagogical comp-
lementary courses (for teachers with a college degree in other areas) or teacher education courses (equivalent to
second degree) do not dedicate any emphasis, or worse, deny the specificity of the Brazilian racial issues. Thus,
the teachers take over the direction of a classroom not having the slightest idea of what problems they will face;
most of the times, the solution for these emerging conflicts are sought in their common sense, in the everyday
practice, regardless of any pedagogical ballast. (Sant’Ana, 2005, p. 46)

These problems are related to PETE programs and to the physical education teachers’ discourses and
practices towards ethnic-racial relationships. It is necessary to open this debate and directly address
this delicate issue. On the contrary, we will keep believing that the law implementation would only
depend on greater access to information or the ideological polarization of teachers’ awareness.
According to Gomes (2005, 2012, 2017), the Black community’s movements foster educative pro-
cesses and engender articulated and systematized knowledge that allow us to rethink pedagogies
and decolonize curricula. This educative sense is based on (self)critique as it has been approached
by Venâncio and Nóbrega (2020) in their anti-racist and feminist commitment to physical education
teaching.
The social and economic condition caused by enslavement contributes to the dehumanization of
Black peoples in Brazil. Sanches Neto and Oyama (1999) called attention to the impact of the inequal-
ities concerning PETE, while Bins and Molina Neto (2017) highlighted pedagogical possibilities for
teaching ethnic-racial issues in school physical education. PETE is now a significant space for resist-
ance as part of the process of fostering social justice education in the country and in building affirma-
tive policies geared toward Black and Indigenous communities (Pinto et al., 2014). Also
disassembling the stereotypes and disseminating knowledge on these cultures, PETE programs
are one of the possible ways to facilitate the different everyday practices of Black and Indigenous
peoples into cultural experiences (Rodrigues, 2010).
However, there is a need for more criticality and an urgency for anti-racism in the PETE programs.
According to Clark (2020), it is necessary to foster a critical race pedagogy of PETE by acknowledging
different contexts such as higher education or schooling. For Clark (2020, p. 446), ‘a critical race peda-
gogy embraces political race consciousness […] and must acknowledge the sociohistorical and dis-
ciplinary context with which it exists’. This approach expands the meaning of an anti-racist pedagogy
and includes concerns to meet the needs of Black students as it contrasts with other social justice
approaches to PETE that acknowledge race through the centralization of Whiteness. While Whiteness
724 A. S. M. PEREIRA AND L. VENÂNCIO

refers to a totality – the privileged concept of White as a legit reference for humankind – the com-
plexity of our conceptual framework is underpinned by the diversity of Black and Indigenous peoples
in Brazil. The specific aspects guiding our study refer to the ERER complexities from an anti-racist
standpoint (Nobrega, 2020). We have explored the ERER background and will synthesize its guide-
lines and specific legislation before discussing the findings.

Research methods, participants, and data analysis

As researchers, we assume an intentionality oriented to anti-racism advocacy. To carry out the
research, we rely on one mixed methods approach – quantitative and qualitative – that allows to
‘answer a broader and more complete range of research questions because the researcher is not
confined to a single method or approach’ (Johnson & Onwegbuzie, 2004, p. 21). The research has
been organized in two phases. Firstly, we generated data from a web-based questionnaire
responded to by physical education teachers (Standal & Moe, 2013). Secondly, we used the quanti-
tative analysis of the data, in which we have structured graphics, and then we carried out a qualitat-
ive analysis. The qualitative approach has a descriptive character and reflective purpose. The physical
education teachers’ responses have been entangled with the guiding framework on ERER in PETE
concerning the application of Law 11,645 and the theme of African and Indigenous games and activi-
ties (Corsino & Conceição, 2016). We have performed textual analysis in the ERER documents to gen-
erate meaningful logs.
According to Fox et al. (2003), we have followed methodological principles for the reliability and
validity of data. We have ethically approached discussion groups regarding the anonymity of respon-
dents, protection from harm, data security, and possible benefits to respondents. The questionnaire
with three open-ended questions and one written justification for each question was previously vali-
dated by collaborative peers (university professors and school teachers experienced with ethnic-
racial issues in physical education) – about its consistency, coherence, and reliability – and made
available to teachers through social media. This type of research has become quite common in
Brazil – especially during the covid-19 pandemic – because it can include a greater number of
respondents and its initial approach is safer and less time demanding. According to Freitas et al.
(2004), an online questionnaire offers a series of advantages over other instruments, enabling the
possibility to use resources which would not be viable in ‘ordinary research processes’ and
making it easier to conduct and allowing the respondents to participate whenever convenient.
The first phase of this study was the conceptualization and preparation of a survey (validated
by peers) related to teachers’ knowledge and application of African and Indigenous games and
activities in physical education. The questionnaire was structured by the researchers during the
second semester of 2018 and available for the teachers to respond to through the Google
Docs electronic platform. The questionnaire emphasized three issues: (i) the use of African and
Indigenous games and activities; (ii) the reason why they either use or do not implement the
games; and (iii) whether they agree that physical education teachers should have to teach sub-
jects related to African and Indigenous cultures. We additionally asked for justification, so that
teachers had to provide one statement to validate their answer about the previous question.
A total of 65 physical education teachers from the public primary schools of Fortaleza partici-
pated in the survey. Teachers and schools were not identified in this research, respecting their
anonymity.
The second phase was constituted by applying the same questionnaire as the survey to the tea-
chers, which was made available in November 2018 through a link shared in digital social media and
instant messaging (IM) groups. One private group on WhatsApp (group of Effective Physical Education
Teachers) – counting 117 respondents – and one private group on Facebook (group of Physical Edu-
cation Teachers from Fortaleza City Hall) – counting 290 respondents. The questionnaire was
answered by 25.19% of the teachers (data obtained from the educational census in 2016), consider-
ing the total of 258 teachers from the Municipal Secretary of Education of Fortaleza.4 The teachers
 SPORT, EDUCATION AND SOCIETY 725

were invited to access and answer the questionnaire according to their own interests and free will
through links and private messages. The answers given by the teachers generated automatic online
charts which we have used to analyze data confronting the three questions, and to investigate quali-
tative aspects related to the respondents’ speeches from the extracts of their open answers. The
analysis consisted in triangulation of the data after a brief description of each response, followed
by discussion between the two researchers involved, searching for coherency or contradictions in
the teachers’ statements. For triangulation, we confronted three data sources: the teachers’
answers to the open-ended questions, their justifications, and the ERER guidelines and specific legis-
lation. In this sense, coherent responses should correspond to a proper justification and align with
the ERER documents.

ERER guidelines and specific legislation

Regarding the logs from textual analysis, the ERER is still a topic that is hardly approached in Brazilian
physical education at schools. Although, it has been addressed in pedagogies that inform both PETE
programs and teachers’ practices since the 1990s (Tenório & Silva, 2014). The topic has been briefly
discussed in the former National Curriculum Parameters (NCP) for physical education teaching in
primary and secondary schools (Brasil, 1998). Thus, physical education teachers seem to be
unaware when dealing with ethnic-racial issues. Regarding Black and Indigenous peoples, and
African-Brazilian and Indigenous cultures, we found only one mention to the term ‘Africans’ and
one to the term ‘Black’ in the NCP for primary teaching. Indigenous peoples are not even mentioned
once. There is no mention to either terms in the NCP for secondary teaching. Despite both docu-
ments being prior to the Laws 10,639 and 11,645, PETE has slightly advanced in this aspect. The
documents seem to be outdated in face of the social needs related to this issue and insufficient
to amplify such demands to the PETE programs (Pereira et al., 2019). However, African-Brazilian
and Indigenous ethnic-racial issues are addressed deeper in the NPC section of cultural plurality
and sexual orientation as cross-disciplinary themes (Brasil, 1997), but they are still overshadowed
and poorly executed.
We understand that the law could and should be implemented for all the curricular components and physical
education as a subject whose specialization is present in the language field, and can perform a fundamental role
proposing a reflection upon the historic and everyday life construction processes, which refers to the contri-
butions of Indigenous, African and African-Brazilian embodied cultural manifestations in Brazil […]. (Corsino
& Conceição, 2016, p. 8)

Another document – the Actions and Orientations for the ERER (Brasil, 2006) – approaches a by-topic
which deepens the debate on research and action about ethnic-racial relationships in the teachers’
professional education, recognizing the importance of addressing teacher education. Regarding
games and activities studies as teaching subjects, Fassheber (2010, p. 75) points out that ‘[…] unfor-
tunately, the available literature is not one of the richest in ethnographic data. It seems that social
scientists have neglected describing practices which concern traditional games all around the world
for a long time, especially in Brazil.’
When we attentively analyze the subjects which are explicitly developed in most schools and what is empha-
sized in the curricular purposes, the presence of the so-called hegemonic cultures is crushingly noticed. The
culture or voices of the marginalized and/or social groups which do not dispose important power structures con-
tinue to be silenced when not stereotyped and deformed in order to annulate all possibilities of reactions.
(Santomé, 1995, p. 163)

Physical education curriculum must contribute with affirmative actions, as stated by Law 11,645,
‘valuing diversity in order to overcome ethnic-social inequality present in Brazil’s school education
in all different levels of schooling’ (Brasil, 2004, p. 12). However, what is contested is that African
and Indigenous games and activities are not commonly taught in the pedagogical practices of phys-
ical education teachers at school. Also, they are not emphasized in the Brazilian academic
726 A. S. M. PEREIRA AND L. VENÂNCIO

production, since the PETE still values and disseminates colonized knowledge as hegemonic stan-
dards (Soares, 1994).

Findings from open-ended questions and justifications

Regarding the data gathered in question 1, ‘Do you use African and Indigenous games or activities in
your class?’, the lack of teaching concerning Black and Indigenous cultural elements in physical edu-
cation classes is reinforced when only 16 teachers (24.6%) affirmed to teach games and/or activities,
for example: Indigenous fights, spear launching, mancala, cat’s bed game, shuttlecock and kakopi.
However, some games and activities were highlighted by the teachers, referring to racial issues
without criticality, such as in the Saci’s race and Josh’s slaves’ games.5 This commitment rate is rela-
tively lower and confirmed with the subsequent justification for the previous answer. We faced a
doubt from one of the teachers: ‘I’ve already worked with Capoeira, but I don’t know if I should con-
sider it, because it was created here in Brazil, but has its roots in Africa (Teacher 1)’. Or, when another
teacher mentioned: ‘I could be working with it, but I have no knowledge about its origins (Teacher 2)’.
There is confusion whether many popular games have either African or Indigenous origin, as the one
mentioned above (shuttlecock). There is still a lack of knowledge about teaching these games with
the due societal or historical contextualization of these peoples’ influence on Brazilian culture. There-
fore, knowledge from PETE is insufficient to address them critically. Then, a reflection upon the silen-
cing processes is necessary.
What we note from question 1 is that the respondents affirmed that they had not been educated –
in PETE and/or other teacher education courses – to approach African and Indigenous games and
activities. This goes alongside with the reports from the study by Flintoff and Webb (2012) involving
physical education teachers about the theme of Black peoples and ethnic minorities. Flintoff and
Webb’s findings suggested that PETE has been largely ineffective in helping teachers see the connec-
tions between the professional and personal relationships linked to race and ethnicity.
The approach of ethnic-racial in basic education depends a lot on initial and continued teacher education. They
still need to advance beyond the discourses; if on the one hand, academic research around the racial issue is
necessary, on the other hand, it must arrive in schools and classrooms, previously altering the spaces of
teacher education. (Brasil, 2006, p. 128)

As the research by Douglas and Halas (2001) and Nelson (2012) contested, there is little attention
given towards the ethnic and racial issues in physical education and in PETE, although there is
recent research on the field (Clark, 2020). On the one hand, Nelson (2012) calls attention to a lack
of racial diversity, as well as the supremacy of White people in higher education, and suggests an
immediate necessity to advocate for equality in physical education, which supports our argument
that the PETE programs reflect hegemonic standards, denying practices upon the ethnic-racial
issues at school. On the other hand, Clark (2020) advocates for a critical race pedagogy of PETE
instead of the overemphasis on Whiteness in teacher education because of the risk of invisibility
of Black people, Blackness, and anti-racism issues. According to the answers to question 2, ‘If the pre-
vious answer was negative, cite why you would not teach it’, the reasons to not address African and
Indigenous games and activities are various: religious and personal beliefs, lack of PETE subjects,
prejudice, never paid attention to such an issue, no particular reason at all, ‘may even be teaching
it, but I do not have any knowledge about its origin’ (Teacher 3), and lack of access.
There is some contradiction because despite the teachers’ statements about not teaching Black
and Indigenous game and activities as cultural elements, 95.4% of them state that physical education
teachers have to teach subjects related to African and Indigenous cultures in their classes in response
to question 3, ‘Do you think that physical education teachers have to teach the subjects of African and
Indigenous culture in the classes?’. The lack or deficit of ERER in PETE contributes to the silencing of
ethnic-racial issues, reinforcing Whiteness in a curriculum based on hegemonic subjects. We inferred
that in addition to thinking about new PETE settings which meet Law 11,645, we must rethink its
curriculum, since they became the object of disputes, especially for the organized subjects in the
 SPORT, EDUCATION AND SOCIETY 727

collective actions and social movements (Arroyo, 2011). The teachers had an opportunity to justify
their previous answers, and some of them knew about the application of Law 11,645: ‘First, it is
stated in the law. Second, in my PETE program it was not possible to see this subject, then there
is a need for specific education’ (Teacher 1). Nonetheless, some teachers denied the multi-cultural
aspects that the embodied practices have or mocked the obligatory character of the law and the
relevance of pedagogical treatment of the issues in question:
There are more important, interesting and relevant subjects. (Teacher 2)

I think we have much more relevant, attractive and meaningful subjects. (Teacher 3)

I don’t think that it should be obligatory; however, I believe that the subject would add to the motor behavior
scope in an embodied culture of movement. (Teacher 4)

Following what was stated by Teacher 4, perhaps teaching African and Indigenous games could
enhance more than the students’ motor skills. Some teachers admitted that their PETE programs
taught them what they practice nowadays. Their PETE programs have been based on a Euro-cen-
tered culture, anchored on an excluding and often discriminatory curriculum perspective (Brasil,
2006, p. 127). We highlight Gomes’ statement (2012) which defines the curriculum decolonization
as an urgent challenge for school education. The denouncement against the steadiness of the cur-
riculum syllabuses, impoverishment of the subjects in the curriculums, the necessity of dialogue
between the school, the curriculum and the social realities, as well as the need to educate reflective
teachers to advance knowledge about the denied and silenced cultures, while also bringing their
students into this debate.

Discussion
In question 1, only 16 teachers reported teaching African and Indigenous games or activities. In ques-
tion 2, the lack of knowledge was denoted by the doubt of whether they have taught or not. Tea-
chers said they did not address this issue for religious, personal reasons, lack of PETE and
prejudice. We observed that the teachers were not educated to address the ethnic-racial issues, cor-
roborating Flintoff and Webb’s (2012) statement that PETE does not bring connections between race
and ethnicity. The attention to ethnic-racial issues in physical education and PETE must overcome
Whiteness-centered approaches (Clark, 2020). The ethnic-racial approach to education depends
on teacher education and needs to move beyond debates as academic research in this area is
necessary, but it must reach schools. There are contradictions in the teachers’ statements, as
95.4% affirm that they need to teach subjects related to ethnic-racial issues and affirmed the
deficit in PETE as a factor for not teaching the theme. The teachers justified their answers, some
of them knew about Law 11,645 but have denied multi-cultural body practices or mocked the law
requirements about the theme. Teachers said there were more important, interesting, relevant,
and significant subjects. Or they thought it was not mandatory. Some teachers admitted that
PETE is based on a Eurocentric, exclusionary, and discriminatory perspective, while Gomes (2012)
defines the urgent need for the decolonization of the curriculum as a challenge for education.
The actions carried out for the applicability of Law 11,645 in physical education classes seem con-
strained within the school environment. In this sense, the emergence of PETE programs focused on
diversity and social justice involving ERER is necessary (Corsino & Conceição, 2016). According to the
teachers’ responses to question 3, it is also important to problematize how discussions on this specific
legislation could advance in PETE. Ethnic-racial diversity is rarely addressed in Brazilian physical edu-
cation, being discussed briefly in the documents of the former national curriculum. The Actions and
Guidelines for the ERER address research on teacher education but there are not many studies on
games and activities regarding the ERER. African and Indigenous games and activities are not com-
monly emphasized in the academic production and pedagogical practices of physical education tea-
chers due to hegemonic standards. However, physical education teachers seem to be unaware of
728 A. S. M. PEREIRA AND L. VENÂNCIO

these issues. Analyzing the curriculum subjects developed in most schools, we saw that the presence
of hegemonic cultures is emphasized. Then, the culture or the voices of marginalized groups con-
tinue to be silenced and stereotyped. To advance this debate, it is necessary to build new practices
and address them throughout the schooling process. Physical education opens possibilities for
reflection on African-Brazilian and Indigenous cultures, complying with the legislation and contribut-
ing to social and racial equity. Dismantling stereotypes and disseminating knowledge of these cul-
tures in PETE programs – which are significant spaces of resistance and promotion of social justice
and affirmative policies – could facilitate diversity.

Considerations
Addressing ethnic-racial issues is legitimized in Brazilian education through Laws 10,639 and 11,645
but there are complex factors that prevent it. Both the teachers’ knowledge base about ethnic-racial
issues and their commitment to the specific laws are fail. Although Brazil is hugely diverse, we con-
clude that most teachers do not teach African and Indigenous games and activities in their class-
rooms. Even when they affirmed that the physical education teachers must teach these issues,
the results still suggest a lack of initial and continued PETE related to the African and Indigenous
cultural practices. We consider that teaching embodied practices in physical education points to
the necessity of decolonizing the curriculums, challenging the monocultural and hegemonic
model of PETE for the teachers’ emancipation. It is paramount that these complex issues should
also contribute to further research on the subject, as well as to elaborating PETE programs, curricular
documents, and physical education pedagogies which foster new significance for theoretical-meth-
odological proposals to subsidize the articulation and embodiment of ethnic-racial issues. Brazil’s
historical development process is anchored in the deforestation of Indigenous lands and enslave-
ment of Black people. The Brazilian educational system has forged the structures of racist thinking
from that perspective. Beyond this pilot study, the research project could trigger a series of critical
reflections on PETE and lead investigations on physical education teaching that unveil power
relations in the fight against racism and the promotion of social justice.
Furthermore, we highlight that the physical education teachers themselves can critically analyze
their own educational practices in order to seek complexities beyond their PETE assumptions. As
some teachers mentioned self-centered learning with readings, engaging collectively in collabora-
tive communities, studying autonomously within research groups – which go against a colonial edu-
cation perspective – contribute to reshaping their pedagogical praxis. Finally, we call attention to the
extent of responsibility that PETE programs must take in the challenge of building new subsidies for
teachers’ pedagogical practices which meet the expectations of Black and Indigenous peoples. We
advocate for this criticism in PETE to promote social justice with the objective to make the African-
Brazilian and Indigenous cultural elements more visible. Thus, it is necessary to educate qualified tea-
chers to build new critical paths in physical education. We suggest that future research could explore
the effectiveness, intentionality, (self)critique, and intersubjectivity of teaching and learning ethnic-
racial issues in collaborative perspectives with physical education teachers and school students.
Regarding intersectionality in future research, we also suggest that teachers’ ethnicity, socioeco-
nomic positions, and gender could possibly reveal patterns in the data.

Notes
1. The Brazilian demographic census accounts Black, Brownish (Pardo in Portuguese), Indigenous, Yellow and White
to address race or ethnicity. Although more than 50% of the country population self-declares as Black or Pardo,
recognizing African ancestry, the term Black – Preto or Preta in Portuguese – has been often considered naive
because of its straight relation to the color of skin, while the term Negro or Negra has been historically used
by the United Brazilian Black Movements as revolutionary and for self-affirmation since the early 1830s (Gon-
çalves, 2018); then, it is not considered derogatory as in other countries. For instance, the Black Panthers
Party is known in Brazil since the 1960s as the Panteras Negras instead of Panteras Pretas. Currently, the critical
 SPORT, EDUCATION AND SOCIETY 729

sense of Negro is still stronger than Black in Brazil, but its meaning is being revised to enhance its correspon-
dence to the global fights against racism, sexism and to foster educative processes (Gomes, 2017; Venâncio &
Nóbrega, 2020). In this article we refer to the people as Black and to the cultural heritage and diasporic idiosyn-
crasies as African-Brazilian.
2. The Brazilian demographic census accounts as Indigenous the people who self-declare as well as the people who
live in specific Indigenous communities and speak the correspondent languages of those communities. The Indi-
genous lands – where the communities live – correspond to previously established perimeters for each ethnicity
(Carneiro Filho & Souza, 2009). There are 305 Indigenous ethnicities living in Brazilian urban and rural areas – and
in isolated regions – and more than 180 languages amidst them (Azevedo, 2011). At least seven populations are
seriously threatened of extinction because there are only 5 to 40 individuals of those correspondent ethnicities
(Ricardo & Ricardo, 2017).
3. The Quilombolas are inhabitants of the Quilombos, which are settlements in distant areas – usually deep
locations into the forests – that inslaved Black peoples created to resist collaboratively and live organically
(Santos, 2015). The Quilombo is a very important heritage of the African-Brazilian diasporic experience and it
is going to be explained in more detail in the following section. Brazil has specific educational guidelines for
Quilombolas and Indigenous peoples.
4. No demographic data has been collected during the two phases to guarantee teachers’ anonymity; therefore,
this research is framed as a pilot study. Besides, there is not any available demographic data about all teachers
in the state of Ceará, which the municipality of Fortaleza is part of.
5. The Saci’s race is so-called because the participants run randomly on one leg, referring to a Black young male
character from Brazilian folklore who only had one leg. Josh’s slaves are a game named after a song. It is a
popular Brazilian game in which participants sit in a circle and pass on objects back and forth through
musical harmony.

Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge the anonymous reviewers for their thoughtful suggestions throughout the review
process, as well as to thank Alan Ovens and Luiz Sanches Neto for their critical readings of our drafts.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

ORCID
Arliene Stephanie Menezes Pereira http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3042-538X
Luciana Venâncio http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2903-7627

References
Almeida, S. L. (2018). O que é racismo estrutural? [What is structural racism?]. Letramento.
Anunciação, D., Trad, L. A. B., & Ferreira, T. (2020). “Hands up!”: Police stop-and-frisk, racism and structural violence
among Black youth from three capitals in the Brazilian Northeast. Saúde e Sociedade [Health and Society], 29(1),
Article e190271, 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1590/s0104-12902020190271
Arroyo, M. (2011). Currículo, território em disputa [Curriculum, territory in dispute]. Vozes.
Azevedo, M. M. (2011). O censo 2010 e os povos indígenas [The 2010 census and Indigenous peoples]. In C. A. Ricardo, &
F. P. Ricardo (Eds.), Povos indígenas no Brasil, 2006-2010 [Indigenous peoples in Brazil, 2006-2010] (pp. 45–48). Instituto
Socioambiental.
Bedeschi, L. (2008). Cidadania quilombola [Quilombola citizenship]. Instituto Socioambiental.
Bins, G. N., & Molina Neto, V. (2017). Mojuodara: Uma possibilidade de trabalho com as questões étnico-raciais na
educação física [Mojuodara: A possibility of working with ethnic-racial issues in physical education]. Revista
Brasileira de Ciências do Esporte [Brazilian Journal of Sport Sciences], 39(3), 247–253. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rbce.
2017.02.009
Brasil. (1996). Lei n° 9.394, de 20 de dezembro de 1996 [Law No. 9,394, of December 20, 1996]. https://www.planalto.gov.br/
ccivil_03/Leis/L9394.htm
Brasil. (1997). Parâmetros curriculares nacionais: Pluralidade cultural, orientação sexual [National curriculum parameters:
Cultural plurality, sexual orientation]. Secretaria de Educação Fundamental. MEC/SEF.
730 A. S. M. PEREIRA AND L. VENÂNCIO

Brasil. (1998). Parâmetros curriculares nacionais: Educação física [National curriculum parameters: Physical education].
Secretaria de Educação Fundamental. MEC/SEF.
Brasil. (2003a). Lei n° 10.639 de 09 de janeiro de 2003 [Law No. 10,639 of January 9, 2003]. http://www.planalto.gov.br/
ccivil_03/leis/2003/L10.639.htm
Brasil. (2003b). Secretaria Nacional de Políticas de Promoção da Igualdade Racial [National secretariat for policies to
promote racial equality]. Ministério dos direitos humanos. http://www.seppir.gov.br/sobre-a-seppir/a-secretaria
Brasil. (2004). Diretrizes curriculares nacionais para a educação das relações étnico-raciais e para o ensino de história e
cultura Afro-Brasileira e Africana [National curriculum guidelines for the education towards ethnic-racial relations and
for the teaching of African-Brazilian and African history and culture]. Brasília: MEC. http://www.acaoeducativa.org.
br/fdh/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/DCN-s-Educacao-das-Relacoes-Etnico-Raciais.pdf
Brasil. (2006). Orientações e ações para a educação das relações étnico-raciais [Guidelines and actions for the education
towards ethnic-racial relations]. Ministério da Educação, Secretaria da Educação Continuada, Alfabetização e
Diversidade. SECAD.
Brasil. (2008). Lei n° 11.645, de 10 de março de 2008 [Law No. 11,645, of March 10, 2008]. http://www.planalto.gov.br/
ccivil_03/_ato2007-2010/2008/lei/l11645.htm
Brasil. (2014). Lei n° 12.990, de 9 de junho de 2014 [Law No. 12,990, of June 9, 2014]. http://www.planalto.gov.br/ccivil_
03/_Ato2011-2014/2014/Lei/L12990.htm
Cabalzar, F. D. (Ed.). (2012). Educação escolar indígena do Rio Negro, 1998-2011: Relatos de experiências e lições aprendidas
[Indigenous school education in Rio Negro, 1998-2011: Reports of experiences and lessons learned]. Instituto
Socioambiental.
Carneiro Filho, A., & Souza, O. B. (Eds.). (2009). Atlas of pressures and threats to Indigenous lands in the Amazon. Instituto
Socioambiental.
Cavalleiro, E. S. (Ed.). (2001). Racismo e anti-racismo na educação: Repensando nossa escola [Racism and anti-racism in
education: Rethinking our school]. Selo Negro.
Clark, L. (2020). Toward a critical race pedagogy of physical education. Physical Education and Sport Pedagogy, 25(4),
439–450. https://doi.org/10.1080/17408989.2020.1720633
Corsino, L. N., & Conceição, W. L. (Eds.). (2016). Educação física escolar e relações étnico-raciais: Subsídios para a
implementação das leis 10.639-03 e 11.645-08 [School physical education and ethnic-racial relations: Subsidies for the
implementation of laws 10.639-03 and 11.645-08]. CRV, v. 11.
Douglas, D., & Halas, J. (2013). The wages of whiteness: Confronting the nature of the ivory tower racism and the impli-
cations for physical education. Sport, Education and Society, 18(4), 453–474. https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2011.
602395
Fassheber, J. R. M. (2010). Etno-desporto indígena: A antropologia social e o campo entre os Kaingang [Indigenous Ethno-
sport: Social anthropology and the field among the Kaingang people]. Ministério do Esporte.
Ferraz, O. L., Vidoni, C., & Vilas Boas, M. (2020). Bridging the gap between theory and practice: The impact of school-
university partnership in a PETE program. Sport, Education and Society. https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2020.
1851182
Flintoff, A., & Webb, L. (2012). ‘Just open your eyes a bit more’: The methodological challenges of researching Black and
minority ethnic students’ experiences of physical education teacher education. Sport, Education and Society, 17(5),
571–589. https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2011.553951
Fox, J., Murray, C., & Warm, A. (2003). Conducting research using web-based questionnaires: Practical, methodological,
and ethical considerations. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 6(2), 167–180. https://doi.org/10.
1080/13645570210142883
Freitas, H., Muniz, R. J., Andriotti, F. K., Freitas, P., & Costa, R. S. (2004). Pesquisa via internet: Características, processo e
interface [Internet research: Characteristics, process and interface]. Revista Eletrônica GIANTI, 11.
Gomes, N. L. (2005). Educação e relações raciais: Refletindo sobre algumas estratégias de atuação [Education and racial
relations: Reflecting on some action strategies]. In K. Munanga (Ed.), Superando o racismo na escola [Overcoming
racism at school]. Ministério da Educação, Secretaria de Educação Continuada, Alfabetização e Diversidade.
Gomes, N. L. (2012). Relações étnico-raciais, educação e descolonização dos currículos [Ethnic-racial relations, education
and curriculum decolonization]. Currículo sem Fronteiras [Curriculum without Borders], 12(1), 98–109. http://www.
curriculosemfronteiras.org/vol12iss1articles/gomes.htm
Gomes, N. L. (2017). O movimento negro educador: Saberes construídos nas lutas por emancipação [The Black educator
movement: Knowledge constructed in the struggles for emancipation]. Vozes.
Gonçalves, A. M. (2018). Um defeito de cor [A color defect] (18th ed.). Record.
Gonzalez, L. (1988). A categoria político-cultural de amefricanidade [The political-cultural category of Amefricanity].
Tempo Brasileiro [Brazilian Time], 92/93, 69–82. https://institutoodara.org.br/public/gonzalez-lelia-a-
categoriapolitico- cultural-de-amefricanidade-tempo-brasileiro-rio-de-janeiro-v-92-n-93-p-69-82-jan-jun-1988b-p-
69-82
Johnson, R. B., & Onwegbuzie, A. J. A. (2004). Mixed methods research: A research paradigm whose time has come.
Educational Researcher, 33(7), 14–26. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X033007014
 SPORT, EDUCATION AND SOCIETY 731

Kilomba, G. (2019). Memórias da plantação: Episódios de racismo cotidiano [Plantation memories: Episodes of everyday
racism]. Cobogó.
Kirk, D. (2020). Precarity, critical pedagogy and physical education. Routledge.
Knijnik, J., & Luguetti, C. (2020). Social justice narratives in academia: Challenges, struggles and pleasures PETE educators
face in understanding and enacting critical pedagogy in Brazil. Sport, Education and Society, 1–13. https://doi.org/10.
1080/13573322.2020.1732905.
Lovell, P. (2000). Gender, race, and the struggle for social justice in Brazil. Latin American Perspectives, 27(6), 85–102.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0094582X0002700606
Munanga, K. (Ed.). (2005). Superando o racismo na escola [Overcoming racism at school]. Ministério da Educação,
Secretaria de Educação Continuada, Alfabetização e Diversidade.
Nelson, A. (2012). ‘You don’t have to be Black skinned to be Black’: Indigenous young people’s practices. Sport, Education
and Society, 17(1), 57–75. https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2011.607912
Nobrega, C. C. S. (2020). Por uma educação física antirracista [For an anti-racist physical education]. Revista Brasileira de
Educação Física e Esporte [Brazilian Journal of Physical Education and Sport], 34, 51–61. https://doi.org/10.11606/issn.
1981-4690.v34i0p51-61
Pereira, A. S. M. (2020). Aninhá vaguretê: Corpo e simbologia no ritual do torém dos indíos Tremembé [Aninhá vaguretê:
Body and symbolism in the ritual of the Torém of the Tremembé Indigenous people]. Appris.
Pereira, A. S. M., Gomes, D. P., Carmo, K. T., & Silva, E. V. M. (2019). Aplicação das leis 10.639/03 e 11.645/08 nas aulas de
educação física: Diagnóstico da rede municipal de Fortaleza/CE [Application of laws 10.639/03 and 11.645/08 in
physical education classes: Diagnosis of the municipal network in Fortaleza, Ceará]. Revista Brasileira de Ciências
do Esporte [Brazilian Journal of Sport Sciences], 41(4), 341–342. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rbce.2019.10.001
Pinto, F. M., Macamo, A. J., & Azevedo, N. (2014). Ensinando práticas corporais de origem afrobrasileira e africana na
educação física escolar [Teaching body practices of African-Brazilian and African origin in school physical education].
Revista Brasileira de Ciências do Esporte [Brazilian Journal of Sport Sciences], 36(2), 370–384. http://revista.cbce.org.br/
index.php/RBCE/article/view/2139
Ricardo, C. A., & Ricardo, F. P. (2017). Povos indígenas no Brasil, 2011-2016 [Indigenous peoples in Brazil, 2011-2016].
Instituto Socioambiental.
Rodrigues, A. C. L. (2010). A educação física escolar e LDB: Assumindo a responsabilidade na aplicação das leis 10.639/03
e 11.645/08 [School physical education and LDB: Taking responsibility for the application of laws 10.639/03 and
11.645/08]. Reflexão e Ação [Reflection and Action], 18(1), 125–150. https://online.unisc.br/seer/index.php/reflex/
article/view/1242
Sanches Neto, L., & Oyama, E. R. (1999). Da escravidão negra à escravidão econômica contemporânea: Implicações para
a educação física no Brasil [From Black slavery to contemporary economic slavery: Implications for physical education
in Brazil]. Discorpo, 9, 45–73. http://cev.org.br/biblioteca/da-escravidao-negra-escravidao-economica-
contemporanea-implicacoes-para-educacao-fisica-brasil/
Sanches Neto, L., & Venâncio, L. (2020). A luta por visibilidade dɘs afrolatinɘs como desafio curricular à educação física
antirracista [The fight for visibility of Afrolatinɘs as a curricular challenge to anti-racist physical education]. In I. P.
Filgueiras, & D. T. Maldonado (Eds.), Currículo e prática pedagógica de educação física escolar na América Latina
[Curriculum and pedagogical practice of school physical education in Latin America] (pp. 19–33). CRV.
Sanches Neto, L., Venâncio, L., Silva, E. V. M., & Ovens, A. P. (2020). A socially-critical curriculum for PETE: Students’ per-
spectives on the approaches to social-justice education of one Brazilian programme. Sport, Education and Society.
https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2020.1839744
Sant’Ana, A. O. (2005). História e conceitos básicos sobre o racismo e seus derivados [History and basic concepts about
racism and its derivatives]. In K. Munanga (Ed.), Superando o racismo na escola [Overcoming racism at school] (pp. 39–
67). Ministério da Educação, Secretaria de Educação Continuada, Alfabetização e Diversidade.
Santomé, J. T. (1995). As culturas negadas e silenciadas no currículo [Cultures denied and silenced in the curriculum]. In
T. T. Silva (Ed.), Alienígenas na sala de aula: Uma introdução aos estudos culturais na educação [Aliens in the class-
room: An introduction to cultural studies in education] (pp. 159–177). Vozes.
Santos, A. B. (2015). Colonização, quilombos: Modos e significações [Colonization, quilombos: Modes and meanings]. UnB.
Santos, A. R., João, T. P., Filgueiras, I. P., & Freire, E. S. (2020). Research on the teaching practice itself in physical education
classes: Implications and challenges perceived by a teacher-researcher. Sport, Education and Society. https://doi.org/
10.1080/13573322.2020.1802712
Soares, C. L. (1994). Educação física: Raízes europeias e Brasil [Physical education: European roots and Brazil]. Autores
Associados.
Sousa, C. A. (2019). Educação física e justiça social: Um diálogo com Paulo Freire e Frantz Fanon [Physical education and
social justice: A dialogue with Paulo Freire and Frantz Fanon]. In C. A. Sousa, V. A. Nogueira, & D. T. Maldonado (Eds.),
Educação física escolar e Paulo Freire: Ações e reflexões em tempos de chumbo [School physical education and Paulo
Freire: Actions and reflections in times of lead] (pp. 137–152). CRV.
Souza, J. (2018). Patriarcalismo e escravidão [Patriarchy and slavery]. In J. Souza (Ed.), Subcidadania brasileira: Para enten-
der o país além do jeitinho brasileiro [Brazilian sub-citizenship: To understand the country beyond the Brazilian way] (pp.
153–177). LeYa.
732 A. S. M. PEREIRA AND L. VENÂNCIO

Souza, J. (2019). O racismo de nossos intelectuais: O brasileiro como vira-lata [The racism of our intellectuals: The
Brazilian as an underdog]. In J. Souza (Ed.), A elite do atraso: Da escravidão a Bolsonaro [The elite of backwardness:
From slavery to Bolsonaro] (pp. 12–36). Estação Brasil.
Span, C. M., & Sanya, B. N. (2019). Education and the African diaspora. In J. L. Rury, & E. H. Tamura (Eds.), The Oxford
handbook of the history of education (pp. 399–412). Oxford University Press.
Standal, Ø. F, & Moe, V. F. (2013). Reflective practice in physical education and PETE: A review of the literature since 1995.
Quest, 65(2), 220–240. https://doi.org/10.1080/00336297.2013.773530
Tani, G., Bastos, F. H., Silveira, S. R., Basso, L., & Corrêa, U. C. (2020). Professional learning in physical education in Brazil:
Issues and challenges of a complex system. Sport, Education and Society. https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2020.
1818557
Tenório, J. G., & Silva, C. L. (2014). As práticas corporais indígenas como conteúdo da educação física escolar [Indigenous
bodily practices as subjects of school physical education]. Teoria e Prática da Educação [Theory and Practice of
Education], 17(1), 81–91. http://periodicos.uem.br/ojs/index.php/TeorPratEduc/article/view/27722
United Nations Organization. (2019). Década internacional de afrodescendentes [International decade of people of African
descent]. http://www.decada-afroonu.org/background.shtml
Venâncio, L., & Nóbrega, C. C. S. (Eds.). (2020). Mulheres negras professoras de educação física [Black women physical edu-
cation teachers]. CRV, v. 42.
Walton-Fisette, J., Richards, K. A. R., Centeio, E. E., Pennington, T. R., & Hopper, T. (2019). Exploring future research in
physical education: Espousing a social justice perspective. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 90(4), 440–
451. https://doi.org/10.1080/02701367.2019.1615606