RACIAL DEMOCRACY

262 Pages·2008·0.45 MB·English

THE DIALOGUE ABOUT “RACIAL DEMOCRACY”
AMONG AFRICAN-AMERICAN AND AFRO-BRAZILIAN LITERATURES

Isabel Cristina Rodrigues Ferreira

A dissertation submitted to the faculty of the University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the
Department of Romance Languages and Literatures (Portuguese).

Chapel Hill
2008

Approved by:

Advisor: Professor Fred Clark

Reader: Professor Monica Rector

Reader: Professor Frank Dominguez

Reader: Professor James Noblitt

Reader: Professor Maria A. Salgado
© 2008
Isabel Cristina Rodrigues Ferreira
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

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ABSTRACT

ISABEL CRISTINA RODRIGUES FERREIRA: The Dialogue about “Racial
Democracy” among African-American and Afro-Brazilian
Literatures
(Under the direction of Fred Clark)

This dissertation focuses on the “myth of racial
democracy” in the works of African-American and Afro-Brazilian
writers in the early and late twentieth and early twentieth-
first centuries. Their novels, short stories, and a play
dialogue among each other. The African-American novels Passing
(1929) of Nella Larsen and Caucasia (1998) of Danzy Senna
reflect on their perception of Brazilian reality of “racial
democracy,” which was related to their own racial realities.
Both authors use Brazilian racial harmony as an option to
their characters to experience a different racial relation
that did not involve segregation in the 1920s or violent acts
in the 1960s and 1970s. The Afro-Brazilian selection of
stories reflects on the Brazilian reality for Afro-
descendants, which presents no sign of racial harmony. The
novels Vida e morte de M. J. Gonzaga de Sá (1919) and Clara
dos Anjos (1923-24) of Lima Barreto, Malungos e milongas
(1988) of Esmeralda Ribeiro and Ponciá Vicêncio (2003) of
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Conceição Evaristo; the unpublished play Uma boneca no lixo of
Cristiane Sobral; and short stories of Cuti, Márcio Barbosa,
Éle Semog, Esmeralda Ribeiro, Oubi Inaê Kibuko, Conceição
Evaristo, Lia Vieira and Cristiane Sobral show that Afro-
Brazilian reality in the 1920s and in the late twentieth and
early twentieth-first centuries is of discrimination, and
prejudice, but they reflect on non-violent solutions to fight
against their fate.
In Chapter One, I introduce the subject of racial
democracy, which will be discussed in two African-American
novels and some Afro-Brazilian literary works. Chapters Two
and Three are overviews of Brazilian history, examining the
role and perception of Afro-descendants by society, and Afro-
Brazilian literature throughout the centuries, respectively.
The former helps readers understand how important the “myth of
racial democracy” was to maintain the order and power to those
controlling the country’s economy and politics. Chapter Four
examines African-American novels, relating them not only to
their perception of Brazil, but also to their own history and
racial relations. Chapter Five shows different racial issues
discussed in some of the works. These interpretations of
Brazilian racial reality can dismantle the discourse of the
“myth of racial democracy.” The last Chapter is the conclusion
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of what I presented and discussed in the previous chapters and
some thoughts about future research topics.

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To God, my mother, Benícia Rodrigues da Costa, and in memory
of my father, Geraldo Magela Ferreira, for their guidance,
support, love, encouragement and patience. Without these
things this dissertation could not have been possible.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter
I. INTRODUCTION ....................................... 1
II. AFRO-BRAZILIAN SOCIO-HISTORICAL CONTEXT ........... 18
Colonial Period (1500-1822) ....................... 18
Imperial Period (1822-1889) ....................... 33
Republican Period (1889-present) .................. 49
III. AFRO-BRAZILIAN LITERATURE: AN OVERVIEW ............ 77
IV. AFRICAN-AMERICAN LITERARY WORKS: VIEWS OF
BRAZILIAN RACIAL DEMOCRACY ....................... 127
The American Perception of Brazilian Racial
Democracy ........................................ 128
African-American Literary Reading of Brazilian
Racial Democracy ................................. 161
Racial Democracy in Passing: To Escape
Segregation ...................................... 161
Racial Democracy in Caucasia: Self-Consciousness . 172
V. AFRO-BRAZILIAN LITERARY WORKS: DECONSTRUCTION OF
FREYRE’S RACIAL DEMOCRACY ........................ 186
Racism and Discrimination Challenged by Lima
Barreto .......................................... 187
Social Separation or Segregation ................. 189
Opportunities for Progress ....................... 195
Racism and Discrimination Questioned in Cadernos
negros and Other Works ........................... 200
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Social Mobility .................................. 201
Self-Image of the Black Body ..................... 207
Identity and Tradition ........................... 216
Justice and Revenge .............................. 224
VI. CONCLUSION ....................................... 231
BIBLIOGRAPHY .......................................... 237
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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION

[R]ace is a social and cultural
construction and not a fact of
nature or a primordial given.
(Fredrickson 3)

The present study aims to investigate the dialogue about
“racial democracy” among selected literary texts of Afro-
Brazilian and African-American literatures published since the
1920s. In the 1920s, African-Americans viewed Brazil as an
alternative to escape segregation laws and violence based on
scholars’ and travelers’ accounts about racial relations in
Brazil. Only a few Afro-Brazilian writers would admit the
condition of Afro-Brazilians being oppressed in this
supposedly racial harmonious society. Then, in the 1960s and
1970s, African-American scholars and intellectuals viewed
racial relations in Brazil more clearly. Their visits to the
country led them to question its harmony and, at the same
time, Brazilian Afro-descendants’ movements flourished,
influenced by the ones in the United States. Two important
goals of the Brazilian movements were to bring self-awareness
and a sense of identity to the Afro-Brazilian community and to
deconstruct the “myth of racial democracy.” Hence, I want to
examine the way in which examples of twentieth-century
African-American and Afro-Brazilian prose fiction perceive and
critique the concept of “racial democracy” in Brazil. I hope
to help my readers understand how blacks’ personal exploration
of race and identity, as seen through African-Americans and
Afro-Brazilians’ experiences, forge a new consciousness about
themselves and Brazil.
In order to achieve the objectives of my dissertation I
want to examine Brazilian history focusing on racial
relations, which led to Gilberto Freyre’s sociological theory
of the “myth of racial democracy.” This myth was based on the
harmonious relationship established by slaves and their
masters and was associated with the ideology of “whitening”
the Brazilian population established by the government’s
immigration policy. This Brazilian project has been both
defended and criticized by some scholars. The examination of
some scholarly works is the theory on which I will base my
analysis and my selection of African-Americans and Afro-
Brazilians’ literary works. The fact that Brazil has never
practiced legal segregation and discrimination does not
guarantee that it is a racially harmonious country. Brazilian
society does not offer the same opportunities to all its
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