Narratives of Women Folk Performers from the Casa Moringa Collective

Abstract

This article analyzes processes of gender decolonization through the narratives of women folk performers associated with Casa Moringa, a collective active in the Federal District of Brazil since 2011. Grounded in (auto)biographical research and decolonial feminist theory, the study examines how these artists’ experiences reveal forms of resistance to sexism, patriarchy, and coloniality that also operate within popular cultures. The article argues that, by occupying the center of the circle, these women transform artistic, pedagogical, and community practices into modes of knowledge production, ancestral recognition, and cultural reinvention. The narratives analyzed show that Casa Moringa articulates orality, Griô Pedagogy, memory, play, and female protagonism as strategies for confronting gender inequalities and constructing situated epistemologies. The article concludes that women folk performers do not merely preserve popular traditions; they also challenge and recreate them, proposing new forms of existence, belonging, and resistance within Brazilian popular cultures.