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Abstract

This paper presents the results of ongoing research about the process of Geographical Indication (GI) and certification as a handcrafted product for the cassava flour produced in the city of Bragança, part of the Brazilian Amazon. The research is developed through archival research and fieldwork with farmers and policymakers located in the cities of Augusto Corrêa, Tracuateua, and Bragança. We observe several aspects of this certification process, comparing the conceptions of “good flour” carried by science and by the traditional populations (mainly indigenous, quilombola and riverside population), observing the discourse constructed by the public entities that take part of the process, where the purity of the product is questioned by the academic meritocracy of the scientific communities. We also consider the debate based on anthropological theory and historiography (Canclini, 1997; Bourdieu, 1989) of how the movement of Western capitalist societies calls for an escape from the standardization as a choice with symbolic representations. In other words, consumption also has political and citizen dimensions, encouraging desires that become demands and acts that are socially regulated. For the purpose of our study, the certification of provenance shows “good taste”, which justifies its acceptance, especially reframing the act of eating cassava flour historically associated in Brazil with poverty and misery.