This chapter focuses on institutions emerging from Black social worlds at the moment when Brazilian intellectuals (such as Gilberto Freyre and Arthur Ramos) were “discovering,” with a certain fascination, the African and enslaved contribution to Brazilian society. The term africano, initially pejorative (close in meaning to bossal), also came to designate a set of practices introduced by recently enslaved Africans that eventually became hegemonic within the slave world.

These practices enabled enslaved and formerly enslaved people in the final decades of slavery to form resistant organizations capable of defending acquired positions (such as allocated land and jobs in the port of Rio de Janeiro). In the social configuration of Madureira, these “Africans” occupied the most marginal spaces but, as bearers of a culture of resistance and autonomy, they were at the origin of samba schools—renewed forms of resistance and adaptation to the industrial metropolis.

Drawing on biographical accounts collected by samba historiography, studies of jongo, and the archives of the Resistencia labor union, the chapter shows how, two generations after abolition, the link between Africa, skin color, and slavery became increasingly loosened, opening a more fluid social space and new possibilities for mobility.