Abstract
A martial art originating among enslaved Africans in Brazil, capoeira has diffused globally since the mid-1970s. This spread raises questions of cultural encounter, authenticity, and power relations. In this chapter we explore the role of migrants in the spread and complex cultural encounters of capoeira events within New Zealand, where the activity first arrived in the 1990s. In New Zealand, capoeira has taken place at a marae - indigenous community hubs, governed by Māori kaupapa (protocols). Here, Afro-Brazilian, Pākehā (European settler), and Māori frameworks come into contact. We consider the role of mestres (teachers), who migrate and travel as advocates and pioneers along capoeira’s lines of diffusion. A two-year ethnography revealed that for visiting Brazilian mestres, local Pākehā mestres, and their students, a capoeira event is often their first time on a marae and first intimate exposure to Māori culture. We detail how mestres play an influential role in framing authenticity and the new cultural hybridities that emerge in this cultural context.