Mixed-race Brazilian
Encyclopedia
Brazilian censuses do not use a "multiracial" category. Instead, the censuses use skin colour categories, with a Pardo
(brown) one, that may include people of varied "mixed racial" ancestry, but probably also accounts for non-mixed acculturated Amerindians. According to the 2006 PNAD, "pardos" make up 79.782 million people, or 42.6% of Brazil's population.
According to some DNA
researches, Brazilians predominantly possess some degree of mixed-race ancestry, though less than half of the country's population classified themselves as "pardos" in the census. This is not seen as any kind of misclassification, since the census categories are not, and do not pretend to be, based on ancestry, but rather on skin colour.
in 1500, Brazil was inhabited by nearly five million Amerindians. The Portuguese colonisation of Brazil started in the sixteenth century. In the first two centuries of colonization, 100,000 Portuguese arrived in Brazil (around 500 colonists per year). In the eighteenth century, 600,000 Portuguese arrived (6,000 per year). Another important "race", Blacks, were brought from Africa
as slaves, starting around 1550. Many came from Guinea
, or from West Africa
n countries - by the end of the eighteenth century many had been taken from Congo
, Angola
and Mozambique
(or, in Bahia
, from Nigeria
). By the time of the end of the slave trade in 1850, around 3.5 million slaves had been brought to Brazil–37% of all slave traffic between Africa and the Americas.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a considerable influx of mainly European immigrants arrived to Brazil. According to the Memorial do Imigrante, Brazil attracted nearly 5 million immigrants between 1870 and 1953. Most of the immigrants were from Italy or Portugal, but also significant numbers of Germans, Spaniards, Japanese and Syrian-Lebanese.
The Portuguese settlers were the ones to start the intensive race-mixing process in Brazil. Miscegenation
in Brazil, according to many Historians, was not a pacific process as some used to believe: it was a domination form found from the Portuguese against the Native Brazilian and African populations.
The White Portuguese population in Brazil never outnumbered the non-White one. The numbers of Indigenous peoples and African slaves were much higher during Colonial Brazil
. However, in the 19th century, there were more Brazilians of mixed Portuguese descent than those of pure African or Indian descent.
s or did not bring their wives
. For that reason the first interracial marriages in Brazil occurred between Portuguese male
s and Amerindian female
s.
In Brazil, people of White/Indian ancestry are historically known as caboclo
s or mameluco
s. They predominated in many regions of Brazil. One example are the Bandeirantes
(Brazilian colonial scout
s who took part in the Bandeiras, exploration expeditions) who operated out of São Paulo
, home base for the most famous bandeirantes.
Indians, mostly free men and mameluco
s, predominated in the society of São Paulo
in the 16th and early 17th centuries and outnumbered Europeans. The influential families generally bore some Indian blood and provided most of the leaders of the bandeiras, with a few notable exceptions such as Antonio Raposo Tavares (1598–1658), who was European born.
According to some Historians, Portuguese settlers in Brazil used to prefer to marry Portuguese-born females. If not possible, the second option were Brazilian-born females of recent Portuguese background. The third option were Brazilian-born women of distant Portuguese ancestry. However, the number of White females in Brazil was very low during the Colonial period, causing a large number of interracial relationships in the country.
White/Black relationships in Brazil started as early as the first Africans were brought as slaves in 1550. The Mulattoes (people of White/Black ancestry) were also enslaved, though some children of rich aristocrat
s and owners of gold mines were educated and became important people in Colonial Brazil. Probably, the most famous case was Chica da Silva
, a mixed-race Brazilian slave who married a rich gold mine owner and became one of the richest people in Brazil.
Other mulattoes largely contributed to Brazil's culture: Aleijadinho
(sculptor and architect
), Machado de Assis (writer
), Lima Barreto
(writer
), Chiquinha Gonzaga
(composer
), etc.
In 1835, Blacks made up the majority of Brazil's population. In 1872, their numbers was largely decreased, outnumbered by Mulattoes and Whites.
According to genetic studies, 86% of Brazilians have, at least, 10% of Black African genes.
A more recent phenomenon in Brazil are intermarriages between Japanese Brazilians and non-Japanese. Though people of Japanese
descent make up only 0.7% of the country's population, they are the largest Japanese community outside of Japan
, with over 1.5 million people. In the areas with large numbers of Japanese, such as São Paulo
and Paraná
, since the 1970s large numbers of Japanese-descendants started marrying people of other "races". Although interracial relationships are not well accepted in Japan, they are accepted and often celebrated in Brazilian society.
Nowadays, among the 1.5 million Brazilians of Japanese descent, 28% have some non-Japanese ancestry. The number reaches only 6% among the children of Japanese immigrants, but 61% among the great-grandchildren of Japanese immigrants.
Pardo
In Brazil, Pardo is a race/colour category used by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics in Brazilian censuses. It is a Portuguese word that encompasses various shades of brown, but is usually translated as "grayish-brown"...
(brown) one, that may include people of varied "mixed racial" ancestry, but probably also accounts for non-mixed acculturated Amerindians. According to the 2006 PNAD, "pardos" make up 79.782 million people, or 42.6% of Brazil's population.
According to some DNA
DNA
Deoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments that carry this genetic information are called genes, but other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved in...
researches, Brazilians predominantly possess some degree of mixed-race ancestry, though less than half of the country's population classified themselves as "pardos" in the census. This is not seen as any kind of misclassification, since the census categories are not, and do not pretend to be, based on ancestry, but rather on skin colour.
History
Before the arrival of the PortuguesePortuguese people
The Portuguese are a nation and ethnic group native to the country of Portugal, in the west of the Iberian peninsula of south-west Europe. Their language is Portuguese, and Roman Catholicism is the predominant religion....
in 1500, Brazil was inhabited by nearly five million Amerindians. The Portuguese colonisation of Brazil started in the sixteenth century. In the first two centuries of colonization, 100,000 Portuguese arrived in Brazil (around 500 colonists per year). In the eighteenth century, 600,000 Portuguese arrived (6,000 per year). Another important "race", Blacks, were brought from Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
as slaves, starting around 1550. Many came from Guinea
Guinea
Guinea , officially the Republic of Guinea , is a country in West Africa. Formerly known as French Guinea , it is today sometimes called Guinea-Conakry to distinguish it from its neighbour Guinea-Bissau. Guinea is divided into eight administrative regions and subdivided into thirty-three prefectures...
, or from West Africa
West Africa
West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of the African continent. Geopolitically, the UN definition of Western Africa includes the following 16 countries and an area of approximately 5 million square km:-Flags of West Africa:...
n countries - by the end of the eighteenth century many had been taken from Congo
Kingdom of Kongo
The Kingdom of Kongo was an African kingdom located in west central Africa in what are now northern Angola, Cabinda, the Republic of the Congo, and the western portion of the Democratic Republic of the Congo...
, Angola
Angola
Angola, officially the Republic of Angola , is a country in south-central Africa bordered by Namibia on the south, the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the north, and Zambia on the east; its west coast is on the Atlantic Ocean with Luanda as its capital city...
and Mozambique
Mozambique
Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique , is a country in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the southwest...
(or, in Bahia
Bahia
Bahia is one of the 26 states of Brazil, and is located in the northeastern part of the country on the Atlantic coast. It is the fourth most populous Brazilian state after São Paulo, Minas Gerais and Rio de Janeiro, and the fifth-largest in size...
, from Nigeria
Nigeria
Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...
). By the time of the end of the slave trade in 1850, around 3.5 million slaves had been brought to Brazil–37% of all slave traffic between Africa and the Americas.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a considerable influx of mainly European immigrants arrived to Brazil. According to the Memorial do Imigrante, Brazil attracted nearly 5 million immigrants between 1870 and 1953. Most of the immigrants were from Italy or Portugal, but also significant numbers of Germans, Spaniards, Japanese and Syrian-Lebanese.
The Portuguese settlers were the ones to start the intensive race-mixing process in Brazil. Miscegenation
Miscegenation
Miscegenation is the mixing of different racial groups through marriage, cohabitation, sexual relations, and procreation....
in Brazil, according to many Historians, was not a pacific process as some used to believe: it was a domination form found from the Portuguese against the Native Brazilian and African populations.
The White Portuguese population in Brazil never outnumbered the non-White one. The numbers of Indigenous peoples and African slaves were much higher during Colonial Brazil
Colonial Brazil
In the history of Brazil, Colonial Brazil, officially the Viceroyalty of Brazil comprises the period from 1500, with the arrival of the Portuguese, until 1815, when Brazil was elevated to kingdom alongside Portugal as the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves.During the over 300 years...
. However, in the 19th century, there were more Brazilians of mixed Portuguese descent than those of pure African or Indian descent.
White/Amerindian
The first colonists from Portugal who arrived in Brazil were singleSingle (relationship)
In legal definitions for interpersonal status, a single person is someone who is not in a relationship or is "unmarried". If a marriage is annulled, however, or it is found to have been void ab initio , and assuming the person was not married previously, that individual is single, rather than...
s or did not bring their wives
Wife
A wife is a female partner in a marriage. The rights and obligations of the wife regarding her spouse and others, and her status in the community and in law, varies between cultures and has varied over time.-Origin and etymology:...
. For that reason the first interracial marriages in Brazil occurred between Portuguese male
Male
Male refers to the biological sex of an organism, or part of an organism, which produces small mobile gametes, called spermatozoa. Each spermatozoon can fuse with a larger female gamete or ovum, in the process of fertilization...
s and Amerindian female
Female
Female is the sex of an organism, or a part of an organism, which produces non-mobile ova .- Defining characteristics :The ova are defined as the larger gametes in a heterogamous reproduction system, while the smaller, usually motile gamete, the spermatozoon, is produced by the male...
s.
In Brazil, people of White/Indian ancestry are historically known as caboclo
Caboclo
A caboclo or caboco is a person of a mixed Brazilian Indian and European ancestry. In Brazil, a caboclo is a specific type of mestiço as is the mulato, a person of a mixed Afro-Brazilian and European ancestry....
s or mameluco
Mameluco
Mameluco the word is believed to be of Arabic origin. The word in Arabic is Mamluk or Mamluka مملوك or مملوكة...
s. They predominated in many regions of Brazil. One example are the Bandeirantes
Bandeirantes
The bandeirantes were composed of Indians , caboclos , and some whites who were the captains of the Bandeiras. Members of the 16th–18th century South American slave-hunting expeditions called bandeiras...
(Brazilian colonial scout
Reconnaissance
Reconnaissance is the military term for exploring beyond the area occupied by friendly forces to gain information about enemy forces or features of the environment....
s who took part in the Bandeiras, exploration expeditions) who operated out of São Paulo
São Paulo
São Paulo is the largest city in Brazil, the largest city in the southern hemisphere and South America, and the world's seventh largest city by population. The metropolis is anchor to the São Paulo metropolitan area, ranked as the second-most populous metropolitan area in the Americas and among...
, home base for the most famous bandeirantes.
Indians, mostly free men and mameluco
Mameluco
Mameluco the word is believed to be of Arabic origin. The word in Arabic is Mamluk or Mamluka مملوك or مملوكة...
s, predominated in the society of São Paulo
São Paulo
São Paulo is the largest city in Brazil, the largest city in the southern hemisphere and South America, and the world's seventh largest city by population. The metropolis is anchor to the São Paulo metropolitan area, ranked as the second-most populous metropolitan area in the Americas and among...
in the 16th and early 17th centuries and outnumbered Europeans. The influential families generally bore some Indian blood and provided most of the leaders of the bandeiras, with a few notable exceptions such as Antonio Raposo Tavares (1598–1658), who was European born.
White/Black
White/Black relationships in Brazil started as early as the first Africans were brought as slaves in 1550. The Mulattoes (people of White/Black ancestry) were also enslaved, though some children of rich aristocrat
Aristocracy (class)
The aristocracy are people considered to be in the highest social class in a society which has or once had a political system of Aristocracy. Aristocrats possess hereditary titles granted by a monarch, which once granted them feudal or legal privileges, or deriving, as in Ancient Greece and India,...
s and owners of gold mines were educated and became important people in Colonial Brazil. Probably, the most famous case was Chica da Silva
Chica da Silva
Chica da Silva, sometimes written as Xica da Silva was a Brazilian woman who became famous for becoming rich and powerful though having been born into slavery. Her life has been a source of inspiration for many works in television, films, theater and literature...
, a mixed-race Brazilian slave who married a rich gold mine owner and became one of the richest people in Brazil.
| Demographics of Brazil from 1835 to 1872 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Year | white | brown | black |
| 1835 | 24.4% | 18.2% | 51.4% |
| 1872 | 38.1% | 42.2% | 19.7% |
Other mulattoes largely contributed to Brazil's culture: Aleijadinho
Aleijadinho
Aleijadinho was a Colonial Brazil-born sculptor and architect, noted for his works on and in various churches of Brazil....
(sculptor and architect
Architect
An architect is a person trained in the planning, design and oversight of the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to offer or render services in connection with the design and construction of a building, or group of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the...
), Machado de Assis (writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
), Lima Barreto
Lima Barreto
Afonso Henriques de Lima Barreto was a Brazilian novelist and journalist. A major figure on the Brazilian Pre-Modernism, he is famous for the novel Triste Fim de Policarpo Quaresma, a bitter satire of the first years of the República Velha in Brazil.-Life:Lima Barreto was born in Rio de Janeiro in...
(writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
), Chiquinha Gonzaga
Chiquinha Gonzaga
Francisca Edwiges Neves Gonzaga was a Brazilian composer, pianist and conductor....
(composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
), etc.
In 1835, Blacks made up the majority of Brazil's population. In 1872, their numbers was largely decreased, outnumbered by Mulattoes and Whites.
According to genetic studies, 86% of Brazilians have, at least, 10% of Black African genes.
Black/Amerindian
People of Black African and Native Brazilian ancestry are known as Cafuzos and are historically the less numerous group. Most of them have origin in Black men who escaped slavery and were welcomed by indigenous communities, where have families with local amerindian women.Japanese/non-Japanese
| Miscigenation in the Japanese-Brazilian community | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Generation | Mixed-race (%) | ||
| First | 0% | ||
| Second | 6% | ||
| Third | 42% | ||
| Fourth | 61% | ||
A more recent phenomenon in Brazil are intermarriages between Japanese Brazilians and non-Japanese. Though people of Japanese
Japanese people
The are an ethnic group originating in the Japanese archipelago and are the predominant ethnic group of Japan. Worldwide, approximately 130 million people are of Japanese descent; of these, approximately 127 million are residents of Japan. People of Japanese ancestry who live in other countries...
descent make up only 0.7% of the country's population, they are the largest Japanese community outside of Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
, with over 1.5 million people. In the areas with large numbers of Japanese, such as São Paulo
São Paulo (state)
São Paulo is a state in Brazil. It is the major industrial and economic powerhouse of the Brazilian economy. Named after Saint Paul, São Paulo has the largest population, industrial complex, and economic production in the country. It is the richest state in Brazil...
and Paraná
Paraná (state)
Paraná is one of the states of Brazil, located in the South of the country, bordered on the north by São Paulo state, on the east by the Atlantic Ocean, on the south by Santa Catarina state and the Misiones Province of Argentina, and on the west by Mato Grosso do Sul and the republic of Paraguay,...
, since the 1970s large numbers of Japanese-descendants started marrying people of other "races". Although interracial relationships are not well accepted in Japan, they are accepted and often celebrated in Brazilian society.
Nowadays, among the 1.5 million Brazilians of Japanese descent, 28% have some non-Japanese ancestry. The number reaches only 6% among the children of Japanese immigrants, but 61% among the great-grandchildren of Japanese immigrants.