The Study of Racialism

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/obama-has-brazil-swooning-over-arrival-of-a-black-president/2011/03/16/AB56seq_story.html




Given how Brazil seems to be moving more toward the U.S. model of defining "race" (because of affirmative action), how "white" can a guy from a poverty-stricken family in the "poor, largely black
northeast" be?

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http://www.amazon.com/Passing-Who-You-Really-Are/dp/0939479222/

In his case, pretty damn "white". He looks like a typical Portuguese man.

The point is that it seems highly unlikely that Lula does NOT have traceable "black" ancestry. This is important given the fact that Brazil is now letting its citizens without SSA phenotypes declare themselves "black" for affirmative action purposes.

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http://www.amazon.com/Passing-Who-You-Really-Are/dp/0939479222/

I think the extent to which Brazil is moving towards a U.S. model of "race" is questionable and debatable. Whereas Lula's government has, in the past, proposed adopting this model for Affirmative Action purposes, it has met with criticism from much of the self-identified "mixed"/"pardo" population.

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"Then you are a fool. Be thankful that when God gave you a face, he gave you a fool's face."

I wasnt aware that the poor Sertao from which Lula came from was majority black. Its populated mainly by peoples of diverse Iberian, Amerindian and African ancestries, the first two especially.

Salvador Da Bahia is majority Afro descended but Lula isnt from there.

No one wants to impose what you call the US model of race In Brazil. What they are attempting is a strategy to reduce the exclusion of people with visible African ancestry from socio economic mobility.

This in the face of a wide spread belief that race, phenotype and ancestry plays only a minimal role in impacting one's upward mobility In Brazil. Those making this claim cite the USA, ignoring the fact that a larger non white upper middle class exists in the USA when compared to Brazil.

Traditionally attempts to draw attention to the disparities between brancas, and pretos/pardos was met to criticism that this will lead to heightened "racial" consciousness which will result in US style racial polarization.

The Affirmative Action debate, if nothing else, draws attention to Brazil's deep seated issues affecting its non white populations. It is to be expected that this attention will lead to a focus on improving access to opportunities by the university educated non whites, who are blocked by colorism. Also strategies to deal with the issue of poverty, which disproportionately impacts non whites in Brazil.

Which is why AA, as is applied, is not really realistic in Brazil. Some one can say they are "black" to get preferential access to college, and then revert to being "white" once they graduate. These "opportunitistic blacks" will be seen as and treated on the basis of their appearance, "white", regardless as to what their ancestry might be.

So AA might not help those who might truly need it. People who are unambiguously of part African appearance. This being subtly used against them in obtaining prestige positions in the corporate world.

The previous two posts are verging on advocacy, which is forbidden in this forum. Stop now. Stick to descriptive, not prescriptive prose.

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Frank W. Sweet

I used to post on a forum that some here may be familiar with. There were a few Brazilians on there. One posted a link to one of Brazil’s major magazines in which they polled Brazilians to classify various celebrities and public figures, including Lula Da Silva. (Keep in mind there is no endogamous color line in Brazil and hence, no endogamous communities.).The thing that was not surprising was the lack of consensus amongst those polled. For Lula it was split 50/50 white/pardo, with the remainder labeling him black.

For other celebrities, like Milton Nascimiento, more than 90% labeled him black.

This is similar to Henry Gates’ experience in his “Black in Latin America” documentary in which he wandered the streets of Bahia asking people to “classify” him. Even in one of the most African cities in the Americas, there was no consensus on how to describe him, a person who would be seen as simply black here in the U.S.