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Football and cemeteries:

An insight on the limitations of documentary photography


Writings Football and cemeteries

Video     Football and cemeteries           

This project includes:

Related to this project:

 Video      Discovering my Brazil

About me Interview Discoverig my

Supporters of the São Paulo football team. Brazilians are known for their passion for football.

A supporter of Santos football team. "Be born, live and die for Santos." Are they fanatic to the point of mixing the sacred with the profane?

"Look beyond." Sometimes things are not as they appear.

Vila Formosa. Brazil's biggest cemetery and a public one. Normally people of the lower classes bury their family members here.

A gravestone with the São Paulo logo team. In this cemetery, gravestones have to follow a pre given design.

A gravestone with the logos of the Santos and Botafotgo teams. A few symbols can differentiate a gravestone from the others.

Salete bent over her beloved gravestone. Apparently, he was a fanatic of Santos football team, however a discussion reveals that at the time of his burial she did not know which team he supported.

An exterior wall of the cemetery. "We are waiting for you". Nobody can escape death. Likewise, social inequalities appear to be maintained even in the afterlife.

The World Cup drawn on the cement. Stereotypes lead us to believe that everything in Brasilians' lives is about football.

The entrance to Salete's home. An anthropologist who studied this phenomena has an unexpected explication for team logos on gravestones.

Salete's bed. The anthropologist suggests that after a humble life characterized by poverty, in the wideness of anonymity, people just want to give their beloved a voice.

A doll from Salete's collection. Since it was for Salete's beloved, most symbols do not actually relate to fanaticism.

Salete. Her beloved did not watch Santo's matches, nor did he have a team shirt...But when asked why she chose the Santos logo, she answered that he was a fanatic.

Salete's bathroom. People misuse the term fanatic to justify their choices but the true reason, as shown in this story, lies behind deeply- rooted social inequalities.

In a few days, the World Cup will start.

Unconcerned with such an event, Salete is eager to tell me more about her life.

Heading home, I walk past many tiny houses.

...at some point I stumble upon some young children playing football on the street. Despite what I just realized, I am still inclined to think that they are fanatics

Key words:  Brazil, identity, society, ideas.

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