Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. In capoeira – an art form whose origins were carried across the Black Atlantic by enslaved people, but which developed and grew into a cultural form of resistance in Brazil – we sometimes wish each other axé (pronounced “ah-shay”). In doing so, we would be bestowing on our interlocutor life force, vitality or just positive energy in the capoeira roda (circle where capoeira is played) or in life.
The term is also used in Candomblé and Umbanda, syncretic afro-Brazilian religions with African roots. For me it also symbolises the ability to harness ancestral knowledge and energy to enrich the jogo (game of capoeira), embodying and paying tribute to those who kept the art form alive.
When I lived in Salvador for several months in the early 2000s, I would use the phrase a lot. It resonated with me; it unified me with my family of fellow capoeiras, whose identities found expression in the physical, musical and spiritual aspects of the art. We may have grown up on different laterals of the Black Atlantic, but we could meet and connect with our shared ancestry through the transcendent power of capoeira.
