Race and ethnicity

1
Race and ethnicity

• 30.03.2006

2
Presentations

• Lesser, J. 1999. Negotiating National Identity
  Immigrants, Minorities, and the Struggle for
  Ethnicity in Brazil. Durham Duke University
  Press.
• Wade, P. 1993. Blackness and Race Mixture The
  Dynamics of racial Idenity in Colombia.
  Baltimore The Johns Hopkins University Press.

3
Study of collective identity in SA context

• Early anthropology
• Indigenous ethnic identity
• Communal identity
• Pueblismo, Paisanazgo
• Since 1970s
• National identity
• Regional identity
• Eg. Andean vs coastal identity in Peru
• Maracaibo vs Caracas
• Indigenous ethnic identity
• Consolidated by Europeans
• Pan-indigenous identity
• Race and ethnicity

4
Race and ethnicity in SA anthropology

• Fluidity of the terms
• Racial identity
• Continuum rather than biologically distinct
  categories
• Complex racial terminology
• Negro, blanco, indio
• Zambo, mestizo, mulatto
• guero, moreno, trigueño, cuadron, marrano, rubio,
  cocolo, mono
• Situational character
• Geographical identification
• Eg. Chocoano black (Chocó, Colombia)
• Ethnic identity
• Shift towards contructivism

5
Approaches to ethnicity

• Primordialist approaches
• Ethnicity as real, given, tangible
• Genetic phenomenon
• Product of culture/history
• Instrumentalist approaches
• ethnicity as a political instrument used
  pragmatically
• Utilitarian approach (created by elites)
• Psychological approach (means of recovering
  pride)
• Constructivist approaches
• Emphasis on the situational and contextual
  character and fluidity
• Barth Ethnic Groups and Boundaries (1969)

6
Colonial South America

• Ethnicity/race ? social class
• Pyramidal social structure
• Peninsulares
• Creoles / Criollos
• Mestizos
• Mulattos
• Slaves, Amerindians

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Wars of Independence

• Led by creoles
• Obedezco pero no cumplo
• Major figures
• Venezuelan Simón Bolívar
• dreamt of United Latin America
• Argentinian José de San Martín
• Peninsulares vs Creoles / mestizos / Indians

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19th century

• Latin America paradox
• states preceded nations and national identity
• gt Top-down construction of national identity
• liberal vs conservative nationalist projects
• Retention of pyramidal structure
• Creoles, qualified mestizos gt center
• Blacks gt periphery
• Indians gt outsiders
• Ambition towards racial and ethnic homogeneity
• Blanqueamiento

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Blanqueamiento

• White supremacy
• Assimiliation of blacks and Indians
• gt darkening
• Attraction of European immigration
• Religious liberties to foreigners
• bilateral commercial treaties
• Spanish / Portuguese
• Italians (late 19th century and 1930s)
• Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay.
• Germans
• Chile, Paraguay, Venezuela

10
20th century

• Mestizaje
• Racial and cultural mixture / fusion /
  hybridization
• Originally of Spanish and native
• Mestizaje vs mulataje
• More generally of all existing races
• gt Latin American essence
• just another ambition towards racial and ethnic
  homogeneity
• José Vasconcelos La raza cósmica (1925)

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José Vasconcelos La raza cósmica (1925)

• "It is the central thesis of this book that the
  different races of the world tend to mix ever
  more, until forming a new human type, composed of
  the selection of each of the existent peoples.
• "The days of the pure whites, the victors of
  today, are as numbered as were the days of their
  predecessors. Having fulfilled their destiny of
  mechanizing the world, they themselves have set,
  without knowing it, the basis for the new period
  The period of the fusion and the mixing of all
  peoples."
• "The present circumstances favor, in consequence,
  the development of interracial sexual relations,
  which provides an unexpected support to the
  thesis that, for lack of a better name, I
  entitled of the future Cosmic Race.

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José Vasconcelos La raza cósmica (1925)

• gt Superior race (La raza cósmica)
• Fifth race
• Fusion of the Black, the Indian, the Mongol, and
  the White"
• The only hope for humanity
• gt coming of a new age (the Aesthetic Era)
• joy, love, fantasy, and creativity would prevail
  over the rationalism

13
José Vasconcelos La raza cósmica (1925)

• Eurocentric assimilation, white supremacy
• "white race has brought the world to a state in
  which all human types and cultures will be able
  to fuse with each other
• "Indian has no other door to the future but the
  door of modern culture, nor any other road but
  the road already cleared by Latin civilization."
• Emphasis on Christianity (assimiliation by
  European culture)
• The decadence of the Asian peoples is
  attributable to their isolation, but also mainly
  and without a doubt to the fact that they have
  not been Christianized.
• A religion like Christianity advanced the
  American Indians, in a few centuries, from
  cannibalism to a relative civilization."

14
Asian immigration

• Economic rather than ethnic/racial argument
• Syrians and Lebanese
• Paraguay (eg. Ciudad del Este)
• Indians, Indonesias, and Chinese (late 19th c.)
• Brazil, British Guiana and Dutch Guiana
• Japanese
• Southeastern Brazil ( Paraguay, Bolivia, Peru)

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Nikkei / nikkeijin

• Japanese migration to Brazil
• initiated in 1908
• as contract workers
• intensified in the 1920s and 1930s (esp São Paulo
  area)
• (the United States closed its doors to Japanese
  immigration)
• introduction of a quota system
• ban on Japanese education
• 1960s and 1970s
• Second wave from former Japanese colonies
• Replication of Japanese customs, little
  interaction with Brazilians.
• Kachegumi vs. makegumi (1940s, 50s)
• Differing views on the outcome of WWII
• Violent confrontations

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Nikkei / nikkeijin

• 1990s
• reverse migration to Japan
• 1998 200 000 Nikkeijin in Japan
• Nikkeijin in Japan
• Distinct ethnic communities
• known as "Brazilians."
• Iittle contact with Japanese society
• Consumption of Brazilian products and media.
• reinforce positive aspects of Brazil
• Eg samba and carnival