Abdias do Nascimento was a prominent Afro-Brazilian

Afro-Brazilian

In Brazil, the term "preto" is one of the five categories used by the Brazilian Census, along with "branco" , "pardo" , "amarelo" and "indígena"...

 scholar, artist

Artist

An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...

, and politician

Politician

A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...

.

Biography

Born in Franca

Franca

-Demography:*Total: 328.473 inhabitants on July 1, 2006.** Urban: 324.138** Rural: 6.999*Demographic density : 473,80*Child mortality until 1 year : 12,66 = 1,26%*Life expectancy : 73,03*Fertility : 2,26...

, São Paulo state

São Paulo (state)

São Paulo is a state in Brazil. It is the major industrial and economic powerhouse of the Brazilian economy. Named after Saint Paul, São Paulo has the largest population, industrial complex, and economic production in the country. It is the richest state in Brazil...

, Nascimento attended public school as a child and joined the military in 1930, but was discharged for disorderly conduct a few years later. He received a B.A. in Economics

Economics

Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...

 from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro in 1938, and graduate degrees from the Higher Institute of Brazilian Studies (1957) and the Oceanography Institute (1961). Nascimento travelled South America

South America

South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...

 with a group of poets calling themselves the "Santa Irmandad Orquidea", or the "Holy Brotherhood of the Orchid", and developed an interest for the dramatic arts. Returning to Rio de Janeiro

Rio de Janeiro

Rio de Janeiro , commonly referred to simply as Rio, is the capital city of the State of Rio de Janeiro, the second largest city of Brazil, and the third largest metropolitan area and agglomeration in South America, boasting approximately 6.3 million people within the city proper, making it the 6th...

, he founded the Black Experimental Theater in 1944. He performed in Orfeu da Conceição, a play by Vinicius de Moraes

Vinicius de Moraes

Marcus Vinicius de Moraes , known as Vinicius de Moraes and nicknamed O Poetinho , was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Son of Lydia Cruz de Moraes and Clodoaldo Pereira da Silva Moraes, he was a seminal figure in contemporary Brazilian music...

 that was later adapted into the motion picture Black Orpheus

Black Orpheus

Black Orpheus is a 1959 film made in Brazil by French director Marcel Camus. It is based on the play Orfeu da Conceição by Vinicius de Moraes, which is an adaptation of the Greek legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, setting it in the modern context of a favela in Rio de Janeiro during the Carnaval...

. He became a leader in Brazil's black movement, and was forced into exile by the military regime in 1968.

Life in exile

From 1968 to 1981 Nascimento was very active in the international Pan-African Movement and was elected Vice-President and Coordinator of the Third Congress of Black Culture in the Americas. For the next decade Nascimento was a visiting professor at several universities in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, including the Yale School of Drama

Yale School of Drama

The Yale School of Drama is a graduate professional school of Yale University providing training in every discipline of the theatre: acting, design , directing, dramaturgy and dramatic criticism, playwriting, stage management, sound design, technical design and production, and theater...

 (1969–1971), and University at Buffalo, The State University of New York

University at Buffalo, The State University of New York

University at Buffalo, The State University of New York, also commonly known as the University at Buffalo or UB, is a public research university and a "University Center" in the State University of New York system. The university was founded by Millard Fillmore in 1846. UB has multiple campuses...

, where he founded the chair in African Cultures in the New World, Puerto Rican

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...

 Studies Program in 1971. He held the position of Professor Emeritus at SUNY-Buffalo.

Return to Brazil

Nascimento returned to Brazil in 1983 and was elected to the federal Chamber of Deputies. There, his focus was supporting legislation to address racial problems. In 1994 he was elected to the Senate and served until 1999. In 2004 he was nominated for the Nobel Prize

Nobel Prize

The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...

for Peace.

Nascimento suffered from diabetes and died on 23 May 2011, in Rio de Janeiro, due to cardiac arrest.

Selected publications

• "Africans in Brazil: a Pan-African perspective" (1997)
• "Orixás: os deuses vivos da Africa" (Orishas: the living gods of Africa in Brazil) (1995)
• "Race and ethnicity in Latin America - African culture in Brazilian art" (1994)
• "Brazil, mixture or massacre? Essays in the genocide of a Black people" (1989)
• "Sortilege" (black mystery) (1978)
• "Racial Democracy in Brazil, Myth or Reality?: A Dossier of Brazilian Racism" (1977)

Filmography

• Cinema de Preto (2005)
• Cinco vezes Favela (1962)
• Terra da Perdição (1962)
• Homem do Sputnik, O (1959)

External links

• Joseph A. Page (1995), The Brazilians. Da Capo Press. ISBN 0-201-44191-8.
• Abdias do Nascimento; The Only Brazilian That I'm Proud Of! (biography)
• Biography
• IPEAFRO site on Nascimento