WHY DO WE “PLAY” CAPOEIRA INSTEAD OF “SPAR” CAPOEIRA?

Hi everybody,

One of my favorite Capoeira songs is called “Vamos a Vadiar Angola”, sung here by Mestre Ferradura, the guy in the ponytail.

And check out his amazing game… Lyrics are under the video.

Vamos vadiar Angola

Vamos vadiar Angola

Let’s play around Angola

Angola Vamos vadiar

Angola let’s play around

Pra lá

Over there

Vamos vadiar Angola

Let’s play around Angola

Todos Vamos vadiar

We are all going to play around

Daqui pra li, de cá pra lá

From here to there, here to there

De cá pra lá vamos vadiar

From there to here let’s play

Vamos vadiar angola

Let’s play around Angola

Angola Vamos vadiar

Angola let’s play around

Pra lá

Over there

So, I bet you’re wondering why I mentioned this?

In the martial arts, one of our main goals is to be able to apply our skills to a resisting opponent, and one good way to develop that skill is by SPARRING.

Sparring is a form of training common to many martial arts, and combat sports. Although the form varies between different styles, it is basically ‘free-form’ fighting (relatively), with enough rules, customs, or agreements to minimize injuries.

However, in Capoeira Angola, we don’t really spar, we PLAY.

As you can see in the above video, Although we do exchange blows, it’s done in a very lighthearted, joking manner.

In fact, other names for Capoeira were jogo de crianca (children’s game) brincadeira (joking around), or vadiacao (loitering, hanging out)

You know, it took me a long time to write this post, a couple of months in fact. The main reason is I couldn’t articulate the benefits of PLAYING, as opposed to SPARRING, as a more useful way for a capoeirista, or any other martial artist, to develop their skills.

But then, about a week ago, I came across this amazing video made by Jesse Enkamp. Now in case you don’t know, Jesse Enkamp a.k.a The Karate Nerd™ has a super cool YouTube channel, THE KARATE NERD.

You can watch it here⇩    / karatebyjesse  

Anyway, here is the video below. I also posted some links for the video description on YouTube below the video, that backs up what was said in this video, for you “researchers” out there.

Research & Sources: Finite and Infinite Games by J. Carse – https://www.amazon.com/Finite-Infinit…

Dopamine, learning and motivation – https://www.nature.com/articles/nrn1406

Dopamine Plays Double Duty in Learning and Motivation – https://neurosciencenews.com/dopamine…

Why Your Brain on Stress Fails to Learn Properly – https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/bl…

‘Boxing is a mess’: the darkness and damage of brain trauma in the ring – https://www.theguardian.com/sport/202…

Using Play to Rewire & Improve Your Brain | Huberman Lab Podcast 58 –    • Using Play to Rewire & Improve Your B…  

The Advice GSP Gives to Young Fighters: Joe Rogan’s MMA Show 107 w/Georges St-Pierre – https://open.spotify.com/episode/6dND…

Radio Rahim: Sparring, Not Fighting, Destroy Fighters – Joe Rogan’s MMA Show 107 –    • Radio Rahim: Sparring, Not Fighting, …  

The Yerkes-Dodson Law:    • PSYCH: THE YERKES-DODSON LAW  

Max Holloway: The BRUTAL Hand of God | UFC Fighter Documentary –    • Max Holloway: The BRUTAL Hand of God …  

Mike Tyson: My belts are garbage –    • Mike Tyson: My belts are garbage  

MMA Athletes & Coaches on Light Sparring vs Hard Sparring:    • MMA Athletes & Coaches on Light Sparr…  

Max Halloway on His Performance Against Calvin Kattar: JRE MMA Show 103 with Max Holloway – https://open.spotify.com/episode/6nzG…

Joe Rogan – Hard VS Light Sparring With Max Holloway and Leon Edwards –    • Joe Rogan – Hard VS Light Sparring Wi…  

Gym Wars | Professional MMA Sparring | Part II by Jeff Sainlar Visuals –    • Gym Wars | Professional MMA Sparring …  

Fighters discuss the fine line between sparring hard and getting hurt by MMA Junkie –    • Fighters discuss the fine line betwee…  

 

Once again, please watch the KARATE NERD’S channel,   / karatebyjesse   You’ll find a lot of gems of knowledge here, even if you have no interest in Karate.

 
 

The video and the links above put up a very srong argument for the concept of play as a effective way to develop fighting skills, without hard sparring.

However, there is another area that the concept of play in capoeira can help it’s practitioners. And that is helping to heal from trauma.

 

On the KNOWLEDGE IS EMPOWERMENT, and the CAPOEIRA WAS NOT CREATED IN A VACUUM page, I typed that Capoeira was in part, developed as a response to the trauma that black people suffered during the slavery era.

Now I’m not going to go into too much detail about this subject in this post. If you want to now more, you can go to the 2 pages I mentioned above.

But I did post this video below you, which I also posted on one of the aforementioned pages. It\s frpm THE CAPOEIRA LIFE SHOW, and it explais a bit of what I’m talking about in a 2 minute video.

Oh, and click HERE to buy the book he’s talking about.
 
 

Well, That’s it for this post. I want yo leave you with this little tidbit:

 
 

YOU CAN LEARN TO FIGHT BUT YOU DON’T HAVE TO FIGHT TO LEARN.

HAPPY CAPTAIN COOKED DAY!!!

 

Hi everyone.

I hope you all have a wonderful Valentine’s Day. However, we at Jogo Corpo Fechado would like to celebrate and honor another event that happened on this day.

On this day, British navigator Captain James Cook was killed in Hawaii.

“On February 14, 1779 Captain James Cook of the british royal navy was killed by natives in Kealakekua Bay, on the Big Island of Hawaii. Cook was a true savage, who sailed across the world bringing murder, rape, disease, and colonialism to native peoples all over the Pacific.

When he was killed, Cook was trying to kidnap the Hawaiian Aliʻi (tribal chief) Kalaniʻōpuʻu in response to an unknown person stealing a small boat. In the process, he had threatened to open fire on the islanders.

At this point, the Hawaiians decided they had enough of Cook’s bs, threatened with mass murder and the kidnapping of one of their tribal leaders, the Hawaiian islanders gave him a beatdown on the beach, and a knife to the chest. This put an end to a lifetime of predatory behaviour and conquest of lands in the service to the British Empire.”
– The Australian Holocaust

So today, we at Jogo Corpo Fechado would like all of our readers to join the Hawai’ians and the peoples of the Pacific, as we celebrate Hauʻoli Lā Hoʻomake iā Kapena Kuke, Happy Death of Captain Cook day!

IT’S CARNAVAL!!!

Well, it’s that time of year again! Now, for those of you who don’t know, here’s a small definition of Carnaval.

Carnival is an annual festival held the Friday afternoon before Ash Wednesday at noon, which marks the beginning of Lent, the forty-day period before Easter. During Lent, Roman Catholics and some other Christians traditionally abstained from the consumption of meat and poultry.

It is the most popular holiday in Brazil, and has become an event of huge proportions.Except for industrial production, retail establishments such as malls, and carnival-related businesses, the country unifies completely for almost a week and festivities are intense, day and night, mainly in coastal cities. Rio de Janeiro’s carnival alone drew 4.9 million people in 2011, with 400,000 being foreigners.

Historically its origins can be traced to the Portuguese Age of Discoveries when their caravels passed regularly through Madeira island, a territory which already celebrated emphatically its carnival season, and where they were loaded with goods but also people and their ludic and cultural expressions.

Now I posted that in January, there are a lot of capoeira events leading up to carnaval. I will make some short posts about some of these events shortly.

I will end this post with a small video of carnaval 2024 in Salvador, Bahia.

Welcome to Back History Month!

Yes, it’s that time of year again. The month where every other race, color, and creed in the U.S.A. gets to learn about the achievements of black people in the U.S.A., and the African diaspora.

Now I admit, I don’t post much about black history month on this website, because here at Jogo Corpo Fechado, we celebrate black history all year.

Now, I admit I’ve haven’t posted much of anything last month, and that’s because I was looking at which direction I should take this site.

For now, I’m gonna post some videos of Cappoeira Angola events That took place last month, jauary being the big month where most large Capoeira events happen, leadig up to Carnaval.

Okay, in keeping with black history month, I wanna end this post with this interesting video I just watched.

See you next post!