Terremoto Clandestino: Music shatters borders

Abstract

From January 2019, the Terremoto Clandestino block, made up of refugees, immigrants and Brazilians, meets weekly in Rio de Janeiro. Through ethnographic work, I followed the intercultural block for a year, which includes members from different countries in Africa, Latin America and Europe. In this article, I try to reflect how the creation of the Terremoto Clandestino collaborates in the construction of identity narratives and in the search for the deconstruction of stereotypes, in which the socio-cultural differences of people in situations of refuge are often not taken into account. The article also intends to show how the group's lyrics and performances become tools of political struggle against machismo, racism and xenophobia; More than establishing a new cultural activity in the city, the group's rehearsals and presentations have established themselves as an inter-place, in which the condition of being refugees in Brazil is questioned.