Marie Gisele (featured in the below video) is the image of subversion in today’s music scene. A Brazilian Christian woman who converted to Islam seven years ago, Gisele is a thrash metal guitarist…who performs in a full niqab. Naturally, her emergence on the music scene in Sao Paulo created waves. She was quick to be covered by the Daily Mail, New York Post, NowThis, and even received high praise from Metal Injection — a music magazine dedicated to rock and metal artists.

However, an interview that I read with her left me with a few questions. For one, Gisele proclaims to be very proud of defying stereotypes, and hopes that her commitment to her religion onstage will inspire many like her. However, I have to wonder if this claim is a bit short-sided do you mean short-sighted? perhaps even “self-serving”? on her part. She is a white Christian woman, choosing in her adulthood to convert. Does not her “bravery” to make a statement like this simply serve to reflect her privilege in that her community has no expectations of her to uphold a traditionalist conservative Muslim reputation? For example, the women in our reading from “Cut from the Same Cloth” (like Mir and Deeyah) describe feeling “forceful opposition” from their friends and family as they attempt to maneuver seemingly contradictory identities within more orthodox communities. But Marie Gisele reports feeling nothing but support from her family. Is this because she is choosing this lifestyle as opposed to being raised within the culture? Or if perhaps it is because of the difference in perspectives between Brazilian and Arab Muslim?

Further, Gisele repeatedly makes the point that ‘Music is my focus and the fact that I’m Muslim has no influence on the music.’ This is interesting to me, because it is almost similar to the statements of the boys in Taqwacores. They too did not want to be defined by their religion.  They were punk rockers and Muslims, not either/or. However, the fundamental difference here is that Marie Gisele makes the claim that her religious identity has no influence on her music, while the Taqwacores assert that their Islam is a part of their identities, just as punk is, and so of course the two have effect on one another. Is Gisele able to separate the two into sections of her life because she was a guitarist before she was a Muslim?

 

As there is a significant Muslim population in Brazil (particularly in the suburbs of Sao Paulo), Gisele is certainly not alone. Due to the slave trade, and more recently the influx of Lebanese and Syrian immigrants to Brazil, However, interestingly enough, the larger Arab population within Brazil is orthodox Christian — not Muslim. .\Thus, the greater influence, albeit minor, upon Brazilian life and culture is Arab, but not Muslim. For instance, both the current mayor and governor of Sao Paulo (Fernando Haddad and Geraldo Alckmin, respectively) are Arab Christians. Many foods like tahina and hummus are very common in Brazilian cuisine. Much of the music has a lovely combination of Arabic and Latin percussions, and the huge cultural sensation of Sergio Ricardo in the music scene of the 20th century is only indicative of this pattern. Even in the Portuguese language, many words have Arabic origin and begin with the “al” or “a” sound (i.e. arroz, or oxala! from the Arabic inshallah!). It is incredibly thought-provoking to see such vivid and deep-rooted Arabic influences in Brazilian pop culture, and yet a stark lack of Muslims. This is strong evidence of the Lebanese diaspora within Brazil, a topic to which much scholarly attention has been directed. Yet, that is a story for another blog post.

Sergio Ricardo, a Syrian Brazilian, had huge influence on the music and film scene in Brazil in the 1960s.