“Now you see the funk”: the rise of DJs and the technical turn in studies of Rio de Janeiro funk

Abstract: The present article is a synthesis of the diffuse field of funk studies, beginning with its emergence in 1988 and moving on to 2020. Here, we offer up an analytical key to identify important shifts in the way the musical genre of funk carioca and its circuits have been academically understood over this 32 year period. Employing a review of the relevant bibliography and ethnography of the Rio funk scene that began in 2018, I demonstrate how from the 2010s onwards, an analytical inflection that I call the “technical turn” occurred in the context of the intensified repression of funk and the simultaneous expansion of computer and internet in the favelas. This contributed to increased visibility for “baile funk” DJs, who had been historically overshadowed in the market by MCs. In the digital context in which the circulation and visibility of “baile funk” expands, analyses emerge focusing on the DJ, the rhythms, techniques, technologies and the aesthetic possibilities of funk as electronic music.