African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
280 p., Compares the experiences of persons of African origin and descent in the towns of Baltimore and Sabara, Black Townsmen reconsiders their relationship to eighteenth-century urban environments in the Americas. Following Africans and their descendants through their struggle with slavery, manumission, and life in freedom, Dantas explains how these men and women's efforts and choices helped to define the trajectory of these two towns.
Portuguese and Spanish slavers supplied the Americas with "los Negros," the Blacks. Only those young and strong, impervious to European disease and able to withstand months of torturous living packed in the cruel quarters of slave shipholds survived the middle passage. Those who arrived, stunned and malnourished, lost in a foreign land, were easy prey to the slavers. Removed from a world that had nourished them, left to the mercy of those whose own lack of humanity prevented the recognition of theirs, they were utterly dependent and at the mercy of their captors. Vestiges of racism threaten to dismantle further progress in South America, as they do here. The prophecies of Willie Lynch, a slave owner who created a divisive plan to keep Blacks separate by fostering dissent among them, are coming true. Lynch outlined the differences in physical characteristics among the slaves-skin shade, hair texture, height, etc. By playing up these differences, Lynch promised, "The Black slave, after receiving this indoctrination, shall carry on and will become self-refueling and self-generating for hundreds of years, maybe thousands." Throughout North and South America, Lynch's plan lives on. Color lines rule, with the predominantly European strains remaining in power, and those of darker skin and crisper hair texture continue to be oppressed. It is a chilling reality that echoes down from the brutal suppression of the native peoples of Chiapas to the continued repression of Mexicans here and in their own country, to the harsh discrimination shown the Blacks of Brazil and America.
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
369 p., Provides a history of Brazilian racial inequality from the abolition of slavery in 1888 up to the late 1980s, showing how economic, social and political changes in Brazil during the last 100 years have shaped race relations. By examining government policies, data on employment, mainstream and Afro-Brazilian newspapers, and a variety of other sources, Andrews traces pervasive discrimination against Afro-Brazilians over time. He draws his evidence from the country's most economically important state, Sao Paolo, showing how race relations were affected by its transformation from a plantation-based economy to South America's most urban, industrialized society.
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Journal Title Details:
1 videocassette (59 min.)
Notes:
Originally broadcast on the television program Booknotes on November 7, 1999. Brian Lamb interviews Eugene Robinson about his book Coal to Cream: A Black Man's Journey Beyond Color to an Affirmation of Race. The book examines race relations in the United States and much of the Western Hemisphere by looking at Mr. Robinson's personal experiences in the U.S. and Brazil, where he noted that racism is rare but inequality still exists.
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
221 p., Chronicling the period from the abolition of slavery in 1888 to the start of Brazil's military regime in 1964, Romo uncovers how the state's nonwhite majority moved from being a source of embarrassment to being a critical component of Bahia's identity.
Reiter,Bernd (Editor) and Mitchell,Gladys L. (Editor)
Format:
Book, Edited
Publication Date:
2010
Published:
Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers
Location:
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
251 p., Tackles issues ranging from white privilege to black power, from government policy to popular advocacy, and from historical injustices to recent victories. Includes Gladys L. Mitchell's "Politicizing blackness : Afro-Brazilian color identification and candidate preference," Angela Figueiredo's "Out of place : the experience of the black middle class," Mónica Treviño González's "Opportunities and challenges for the Afro-Brazilian movement," Keisha-Khan Y. Perry's "Racialized history and urban politics : black women's wisdom in grassroots struggles," Sales Augusto dos Santos' "Black NGOs and 'conscious' rap : new agents of the antiracism struggle in Brazil," Fernando Conceição's "Power and black organizing in Brazil," and Renato Emerson dos Santos' "New social activism : university entry courses for black and poor students."
