Centro Comunitário do Salgueiro
The Centro Comunitário Salgueiro (henceforth CC) runs an extensive program of creches, day care, and after school programs in Salgueiro, one of the poorest and most violent favelas in Rio de Janeiro, across the Niteroi bridge. The project has had great success in preventing youth homelessness.
CC began with simple community creches. Mothers came together to share childcare responsibilities. Gradually, the program became more professional, expanded, and gained political consciousness. It now serves almost 1000 children in 14 creches, and is financed by the local government and international NGOs. CC’s special emphasis on theater sets it apart and gives extraordinary opportunities for young people, showing them a different perspective on the world and on their own life.
According to the local press, Salgueiro is the most dangerous neighborhood in Brasil; certainly drugs and gangs are a huge problem, and many of the older children have one foot in the program and one in drug trafficking. More significantly, children have come to absorb this image of themselves, or to reject it in radical and unhelpful ways, like Pentecostal fundamentalism. In almost all cases, this image leads to potent laziness, anomie ("desánimo"), and inertia.
Theater and psychodrama attempt to promote subjectivity (protagonismo) and to deconstruct anomie. It allows children to feel desire again, and gives identity and dignity, even if only while the child is “in character.” This work has been particularly helpful in dealing with the traces of violence, because in drama, one sees the close and complicated relationship between victim and abuser. It is impossible to drop into the manichean ideology that paralyzes many victims of violence. Equally significant, plays performed before families are often the first time that parents really come to know their children.
One of the most successful techniques of psychodrama is quite simple. Children take a piece of paper and then write down the things that anger them. They then burn the paper. Surprisingly, many of the kids feel guilt about burning a paper that says “father,” and this feeling of guilt allows them to see what they love about their parents and to build a relationship on that basis. In little plays, children often play the role of their parents, a process that breeds empathy and deconstructs future bad parenting techniques. In other plays, depression or violence or anomie become physical things, alienated from the child, that attack h/er; this technique allows kids to see what is essential to their being and what they can struggle against.
CC is very conscious of the social context of Brasil, particularly the relationship between joy and sadness, and then how this dichotomy is reflected in violence and victimization. The program uses drama to reconnect subjectivity (protagonismo) and joy; drama is always part of the kids’ lives, but they are generally the victims (the objects) of that drama. CC Salgueiro attempts to deconstruct this facile dichotomy.
CC has found that the relationship with the local gangs can be smoothed by community interlocutors. A schoolteacher who is deeply respected in the community and who taught many of the gang leaders has served as a moderator when gangs believe that CC has stepped on their toes, or is interfering with gang recruitment. Unfortunately, the awkward modus vivendi prohibits CC from any explicit anti-drug or anti-gang work. Instead, they work with identity, self-esteem, health, and other less threatening issues.
In 2004, Shine a Light collaborated with the children of the community centers to make a documentary about the program. You can watch the film here.
Rua Capitão Antônio Franklin, Lote 04, Quadra 03
Bairro Salgueiro, São Gonçalo, RJ
24473-410
21 601 1718
Mauricio Camilo or Vicencia Cesário da Costa, salgueirosg@bol.com.br
