"If he can’t see himself, how will he know?" Memory, knowledge, and education in the Quilombola community of Capoeiras, Rio Grande do Norte
Quilombola School Education (EEQ), Ethno-educational Ethnography, Law 10.639/03, Ancestral Knowledge, Decolonization of Curriculum, Critical Racial Literacy, Anthropology of Education, Capoeiras Quilombola Community.
This thesis investigates the implementation of Quilombola School Education (EEQ) in the Capoeiras Quilombola Community (CQC), located in Macaíba/RN, from the perspective of the Anthropology of Education. The study stems from the need to understand the tensions between legal achievements—specifically Law 10.639/03 and the National Curricular Guidelines for Quilombola School Education—and the daily reality experienced by residents, leaders, and educators, as well as mothers of children studying both within and outside the territory. The general objective of this work is to analyze how the educational process, in both school and non-school settings, is experienced in the Capoeiras Quilombola Community (CQC), investigating the tensions between legal guidelines and the practical reality of the territory. The methodological path involved documentary research on public policies for racial equality, combined with immersive fieldwork. Participant observation was used as the central axis, complemented by interviews with open and closed questions and informal conversations that allowed for the collection of spontaneous accounts. The recording of local memory was made possible through photographs, recorded narratives, and field diaries, which were essential instruments for documenting the orality and cultural manifestations that configure the territory as a space of living learning. Additionally, bibliographic research was conducted to ground the dialogue between empirical data and the concepts of racial literacy and decolonization. The results reveal a significant gap between legislative achievements and pedagogical practice in the schools attended by the community's children. It was observed that the formal school structure still operates under universal models that occasionally dialogue with the Quilombola identity, resulting in the invisibilization of local knowledge within the teaching environment. On the other hand, through narratives and daily observation, it was identified that non-school education, vibrant in community relations and the generational transmission of knowledge, functions as the true pillar of identity maintenance. The study demonstrates that the process of educational strengthening occurs more intensely in spaces of living and resistance than within the institutionalized structure.