Event Recap: Punk Rock Music and the Protests for Free Public Transportation in Brazil

Held on Monday, November 14th, 2022

A full video recording of the event will be posted here shortly.

On Monday, November 14, 2022, the Boston University Initiative on Cities (IOC), BU Department of Romance Studies, Department of Political Science, City Planning & Urban Affairs Program, Center for Latin American Studies, Center for the Humanities, and Center for Innovation in Social Science hosted a discussion by Rodrigo Lopes de Barros, BU Assistant Professor of Spanish, Portuguese, and Latin American Studies. Lopes de Barros discussed his new book Distortion and Subversion: Punk Rock Music and the Protests for Free Public Transportation in Brazil (1996-2011), which details how the Brazilian punk and hardcore music scene joined forces with political militants to foster a social movement that demanded the universal right to free public transportation.

Throughout the event, Lopes de Barros detailed his book’s research methodology and historical findings, chronologically summarizing the movement’s development in four of Brazil’s major cities. His central message emphasized that the single demand for free public transportation re-conceptualized notions of urban space in Brazil and led masses of people across the country to protest. The event concluded with an audience Q&A moderated by IOC Director Loretta Lees.

Four Central Cities

Over the course of his book, Lopes de Barro focuses on four pivotal Brazilian cities involved in the punk scene and Free Fare Movement, including Salvador, Florianópolis, Belo Horizonte, and São Paulo. The book transitions from city to city, beginning with Salvador, which was the site of a 2003 revolt in response to a fare hike dubbed “A Revolta do Buzu.” Florianopolis followed, which experienced two similar revolts in 2004 and 2005 relating to the Free Fare Movement. According to Lopes de Barro, these instances of activism provided a “panorama of political action and art,” explaining that these “earlier protests were closely related to music production, photography, and documentary filmmaking.”

He then discussed the city of Belo Horizonte’s Revolution Carnival, which was “an annual meeting of punks and political militants” to discuss the Free Fare Movement, among other political issues. The book concludes in Sao Paulo in the “hard-core straight edge punk scene,” highlighting the relationship between the Free Fare Movement and straight edge punks, a group of vegan activists who abstained from alcohol, drugs, and animal-products.

Student Contributions

A major portion of the book focused on student contribution to the Free Fare Movement. Specifically, the book highlights students’ involvement in the Salvador and Florianopolis protests, in which youth from local high schools and colleges would disrupt public transportation by blocking high frequency bus terminals. According to Lopes de Barros, “the Free Fare Movement considered that a free fare for students was a part of universal education, and that [students] could not have universal access to education without free access to transportation.” These pedagogical perspectives reached the mainstream of the Free Fare Movement through music, becoming central themes of many punk songs and being highlighted at Belo Horizonte’s Revolution Carnival.

Significance of Turnstiles

Another major component of the Brazilian Free Fare Movement was the symbolism and significance of the turnstile. “Turnstiles exemplify the worst characteristics of transportation,” explained Lopes de Barro, “[they are] a mechanical obstruction through which money is collected in exchange for mobility.” In fact, as Lopes de Barro points out, the cover of his book is a group of protestors burning a turnstile, with several members of the crowd wearing punk t-shirts. In the eyes of many punk activists, “the turnstile represents the administrative bodies of the government [and] as a result, an attack on the turnstile becomes an attack on the state.”

Highlighting Artists

Throughout the presentation, Lopes de Barros highlighted numerous punk bands’ unique political contributions to both the Free Fare Movement and broader revolutionary politics in Brazil. Lopes de Barro covers a myriad of punk artists, including both student and adult groups like Inocentes, Lumpen, Abuso Sonoro, S288, and Guerra de Classes. After introducing each of these artists, Lopes de Barros played short segments of their most popular songs, allowing audience members to immerse themselves in the sounds of the Brazilian Free Fare Movement.

Q&A Discussion

The Q&A discussion began with conversation about the juxtaposing punk scenes in the United Kingdom and Brazil. According to Professor Lees, the UK’s more anarchist punk scene, which was “anti-education, anti-monarchy, anti-state, anti-everything” and had no political hope, significantly differed from Brazil’s punk culture. “[The British punk scene] felt like there was no future,” commented Lees, “whereas [in Brazil] there appears to be a sense that there is a way out through particular action.” Lopes de Barros agreed, asserting that the punk movement in Brazil had revolutionary “anti-capitalist” political roots from its inception and that many of the punk bands that were formed in the 1980’s continue to exist, perform, and protest today.

Discussion concluded with an audience question that asked for elaboration on Lopes de Barro’s “cyber-archaeology” research methods. He first detailed his motivation, explaining that many of the local independent media websites from the 1990’s and 2000’s that covered the Free Fare Movement were taken down as the internet aged. For this reason, he used a sophisticated excavation script that downloaded more than 150,000 files of news documents relating to the Free Fare Movement. These files went on to serve as the primary sources for Lopes de Barros’s book. “That’s the idea behind cyber-archaeology – digital archaeology in the internet archive to see what you can get,” explained Lopes de Barros, “and without the archive, it would be impossible to write the book as it is.”

Professor Lopes De Barros’s book Distortion and Subversion: Punk Rock Music and the Protests for Free Public Transportation in Brazil (1996-2011) is available online and can be accessed for free.