The Handshake That Is a Trap

WHY THIS ARTICLE

The chamada looks like a ritual pause, a truce. The thesis reads it as the game continued by other means — courtesy as ambush, the paradoxical principle at work.

A courteous dance

Hands in hands, the two capoeiristas perform an amusing back-and-forth dance, always on the watch for a moment of inattention that would let one resume the jôgo with a skilful move. The one who called the chamada de mão is the one who must undo it — a rule that must be respected.

The lapse and the throw

He leans his torso a little too far back; for a fraction of a second he hesitates to change feet. Now: one player withdraws his hand and feigns a strike to the eyes with his fingers; the other reacts by pulling his head back, just enough to allow a tesoura or a rasteira to the rear, projecting him to the ground. In capoeira, the couple formed by the players is the product of a constant mutual adaptation.

Why it matters

The chamada is not a truce but the game folded into a handshake. Courtesy here is a form of attack — the clearest emblem of the invitation to rupture.

SOURCES

La capoeira et les arts de combat noirs : histoire effacée, techniques invisibles (1905–1984), thèse de doctorat, Université des Antilles, 2020 (Part III, on the chamada de mão and mutual adaptation in the internal logic).

IN THE CORPUS

→ The Wrestling Whose Interest Lies in a Paradox

→ In Capoeira, You Win by Almost Touching

HOW TO CITE THIS ARTICLE

MALO, Olivier. The Handshake That Is a Trap. In: Black Combat Arts Institute — Articles [online]. No. 77. 2026 [accessed date]. Available from: https://www.blackcombatarts.com/articles/the-handshake-that-is-a-trap. Adapted from the author's doctoral thesis, Université des Antilles, 2020.