Psychodrama as ancestral intelligence: Epistemology of the crossroads and the decolonization of clinical practice

Abstract

This work connects psychodrama with the epistemology of the crossroads, understanding it as an expression of Ancestral Intelligence. Based on the clinical experience with Lueji (pseudonym), a young Black woman and Candomblé practitioner, the therapeutic setting becomes a space for welcoming and reconnecting with silenced knowledge systems. The expression of her cosmoperception required epistemological frameworks capable of resignifying the pain caused by structural and religious racism. Revisiting the work of Guerreiro Ramos and his role in the Black Experimental Theater repositions Brazilian psychodrama as a path back to ancestral roots. Thus, the group dimension becomes inseparable from the psychodramatic process, emphasizing that both illness and healing occur collectively, especially through what we refer to here as Ancestral Intelligence.