Abstract

To analyze the short film Bluesman (2018) this work brings together the concept of Sankofa - originally from the writing of Akan peoples from West Africa - with the concept of Afrofuturism through a methodology that articulates the ideas of circularity and inversion. We start by observing the trajectory of Brazilian rapper Baco Exu do Blues under the “exulic” perspective explained by Sàlámì (King) and Ribeiro (2015); then we discuss the peculiarity of racial issues in Brazil from the concept of “racism by denial” proposed by Lélia Gonzalez (1988); and we conclude using the concept of Afrofuturism to point out decolonial elements identified in the narrative proposed by the work, using the narrative itself as a guide to observing the game of inversion of meanings that is proposed with the notions of before, during and after in the course proposed by the short film. The methodology used is also circular and based on the proverbial ideogram Sankofa: looking for the past, projecting it in the present and providing a future. Therefore, Bluesman’s descriptive analysis gains decolonial significance by articulating epistemologies outside the Eurocentric axis to highlight the logic of resistance present in the narrative proposal and in the themes addressed by the work, a logic that seeks the reverse of the sense indicated by hegemonic thinking.