“The black is not a man”: reflections on the humanity of black men in the Brazilian diaspora from an afrocentered perspective

Abstract

By analyzing the construction of black masculinities in Brazilian territory, the article aims to stress the universalism of the categories of masculinity, patriarchy and gender and evaluate how colonial violence along with racial crossing operate in a dominant way so that black men from the Brazilian diaspora have their subjectivities fractured due to daily and structural racism, do not access basic social rights for a dignified life and structurally are not seen with humanity. From bibliographical research whose character prioritizes the Afrocentric approach and the rescue of historicity, it was understood that patriarchy is a system of power originating in Europe, that gender is a colonial category to define hierarchical positions in society, prioritizing the male figure of the white man and recognizing the pluriversality of masculinities with a focus on understanding how black men experience being a man in this territory marked by racism and sexism, it was concluded that they do not access the visible and invisible powers that patriarchy could offer them and that the universalism that it also encompasses men in a homogeneous and essentialist category, without taking into account other social markers, it is at the service of the physical, spiritual, emotional and subjective death of men who do not correspond to the model of hegemonic masculinity.