Palherino sits right above the main docks where ships brought Africans into the country for slavery. The area was given the name Palherino because it was the place where African people were punished. When you walk into Palherino you are greeted by four large Catholic churches that rope off a section of Palherino where a main stage is usually built for free concerts. During the festivities, barbeque pits with seasoned chicken grilling are set up everywhere. And families sell fruit, foods, drinks and beer, all the while dancing to Rhumba or Merengue. Walking through Palherino you will see women of all sizes, shades and colors dressed in big, elaborate head wraps with full white skirts or dresses. This is the traditional Brazilian dress for black women, most of whom earn their living by assisting tourists to restaurants or around Palherino.
Executive president of Integrare, Maria Hyeronides Barros DeLima, was also present, and represented Brazil as a signatory on the document. She said, "This partnership will allow Brazilian business entrepreneurs to shake hands with Americans who are way ahead and have so much to teach. Brazilians will also have a chance to enter the walls of the corporate world in Brazil and to do business globally. This is a victory for CBCF, Integrare, the Black community and natives and disabled entrepreneurs. It is definitely a global victory!"
Not rooted or identified as a Brazilian martial art, Capoiera Angola is the foundation of which African-Brazilians adapted the rhythmic form of self-defense and offense called Capoiera. The indigineous Capoiera Angola is the mother/father of Brazil's Capoeira, which was formed when Africans from Central Africa were brought to South America in bondage. Capoeira Angola goes further.
"On questions of race, Brazil is enigmatic," [David Covin] says. "Brazil sees itself as a racial democracy, with opportunity for everyone. Yet the country portrays itself as white, and the bulk of the population of people of African descent is marginalized -- socially, politically and economically." Blacks are generally considered a majority of the Brazilian population, at least outside Brazil. The United Nations has estimated blacks make up as much as 73 percent of the population, compared to 12 percent in the United States. Brazil's official census, though, shows the black population at about 44 percent, a sign that Brazil's leadership and population place a premium on "whiteness," according to Covin.
Essence co-founder Edward Lewis welcomes Benedita da Silva, vice-governor of the state of Rio de Janeiro, to Essence Communications, Inc., headquarters. Da Silva, one of the most-powerful politicians in Brazil, was in New York recently to meet with African-American business leaders to discuss economic and political partnerships between Black Americans and Afro-Brazilians.
The United States is a paragon of equal opportunity when compared with Brazil. Even though Brazilians in power have always asserted that the nation is a racial democracy, whites possess all the high status and wealth while blacks struggle for survival at the bottom. Brazilians insist that blacks do not suffer because of their color but because of their poverty. However, the socio-economic data is so racially skewed that the government has recognized the necessity for massive intervention.
[Weldon J. Rougeau] met with Henrique Ulbrig, president of DuPont do Brazil and chair of the board on Integrare. Ulbrig embraced the idea of a summit to be held in August and indicated that the other board members would embrace the idea as well. Ulbrig talked about the value of the inclusion movement from the view of corporate Brazil. He indicated that the business case argument for inclusion had taken hold in Brazil, as it has here in the U.S. Specifically, Clarence Smith, co-founder of Essence magazine has developed a project to establish an airline between Miami, Fla. and Salvador, Bahia, in the northeast of Brazil. Bahia is the center of African culture in Brazil and a frequent tourist destination for African Americans. Currently, no direct flights occur between the U.S. and this region of Brazil. Smith's theory is that a direct route to the area will exponentially increase the number of African Americans traveling to the area.
The carnival image of racial harmony When Brazil became a democracy in 1988, the new constitution specified that they should be given land. But in practice, only a handful have. The local priest in Camburi, Father [Alexander Coelho], urges villagers to unite to demand land. He says that Brazil has a race problem which it is only starting to face up to. "Three hundred years of slavery, 300 hundred years of submission - it's hard to teach people to change that mindset," he says. "In Brazil, there was no discussion about race ... there was a pseudo-equality. When we started to talk about it, we were accused of bringing racism to Brazil," he argues.
