“Assimilação” e Imigração entre Anglófonos no Rio de

1
Expats e Locals:
“Assimilação” e Imigração entre Anglófonos no Rio de Janeiro
Proposta para a apresentação de um trabalho ao GT de Migrações Internacionais, ANPOCS
2002
Thaddeus Gregory Blanchette
TEMA: Clivagens internas nos grupos de imigrantes
Resumo
Os estadunidenses e britânicos, juntos, formam um dos grupos diferenciados mais
antigas do Rio de Janeiro. A presença, em massa, dos anglo-falantes em torno da Baia de
Guanabara data, no mínimo, da abertura dos portos por Dom João VI em 1808.
Mercenários ingleses e americanos tiveram um papel destacado na luta para independência
brasileira em 1821 e, de acordo com os relatórios de viajantes como Maria Graham, o
comércio britânico e os pubs que serviam marujos anglofalantes dominaram o velho centro
do Rio durante a maioria do século XIX. Importantes instituições socioculturais cariocas
foram fundadas pelos anglófonos, tais como a igreja anglicana Christchurch em Botafogo
(uma das mais antigas igrejas protestantes no Brasil), a escola Bennet, o Cricket Club de
Niteroi e, é claro, o futebol. Em sumo, os norte-americanos e britânicos (e seus
ramificações coloniais) tem tido uma presença intensa e contínua no Rio de Janeiro e, de
acordo com os dados do IBGE, são entre os dez maiores grupos nacionais/étnicos que
forneceram imigrantes internacionais para a região da Baia de Guanabara.
Notável, então, que os estrangeiros anglofalantes morando no Rio de Janeiro
geralmente não são considerados, nem se consideram, imigrantes.
O trabalho aqui apresentado analisará essa contradição aparente na luz de
informações que descobri durante minhas pesquisas para minha dissertação de mestrado no
PPGAS do Museu Nacional. Existe, no mínimo, duas redes de sociabilidade, quase
totalmente separadas e independentes, entre os anglófonos do Rio. A primeira, mais visível
e notada publicamente, se estrutura em torno de “expatriados”, trabalhadores contratados
por empresas multinacionais e grandes corporações/estatais brasileiros. A segunda se
articula entre pessoas cuja estadia no Brasil se explica por outros fatores, entre dos quais se
destaca, ou uma acentuada interesse em “coisas do Brasil”, ou ligações pessoais, intensas
e/ou íntimas com indivíduos brasileiros. Analisarei como essa clivagem básica se articula
com 1) os pressupostos do “senso comum” a cerca de que é um “imigrante”, 2) os
preconceitos nativistas brasileiras que visam a redução de alteridade como um marcador do
“bom estrangeiro”, 3) as estruturas, formadores de imperialismo, de transmissão de poder,
prestígio e capital, e 4) a busca da exótica e a manipulação de categorias culturais tidas
como “autenticamente brasileiras” como marcadores de status entre angloamericanos. A
interação desses fatores produz uma situação que dificulta a etnogênese entre os anglófonos
do Rio e diminua a (auto)percepção desse grupo como imigrante.
Obs: Uma versão desse trabalho, em português, pode ser obtida comigo pelo correio eletrônico
através de macunaima30@yahoo.com.br, a partir de 10/10/02. Essa versão é, portanto, preliminar.
2
Introduction
It seems to me that the traditional approaches to ethnic groups and their
territorial/social expressions within the urban environment break down when the group in
question consists of a foreign population originating in countries popularly considered to be
more prestigious and powerful than the host nation. Traditionally, these groups have been
seen as “colonies”, but rarely has their insertion in the host society been looked at as an
expression of migration or ethnicity, their presence being preferentially understood through
the lens of economic relations and/or dominance.
Over the last couple of decades, anthropology and related disciplines have made
significant strides in recovering the colonial history of the 19th century European empires as
cultural interaction between definite individuals and groups within local spaces shaped by
larger concerns of power (COOPER & STOLER; PELS; SAID). In these studies, a purely
economicist view of colonialism is rejected and the colony itself is often portrayed as a
“contact zone,” a “social spaces where disparate cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each
other, often in highly asymmetrical relations of domination and power” (PRATT:4).
Relatively little work has yet been done, however, in recovering the identity
structures of the post-colonial world’s contact zones (see, however, CRAPANZANO for a
thought provoking exception) and it is precisely within this vacuum that the study of
Anglo-Americans and their ethnic projection as immigrants in Brazil must fall.
Anglo-Americans generally consider themselves and are considered to be separate
from Brazil to the point where the use of “ethnic group” or even “immigrant” to describe
them appears, at first glance, oxymoronic. It would be easy to explain this group of
foreigners’ presence, particularly in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, as simply a function of
imperialism in the Weberian sense: an expansion of other nation’s structures of prestige,
power and capital into Brazilian lands and lives (WEBER, s/d: 187-210).
My fieldwork among Anglo-American residents of Rio de Janeiro has led me to
question the universality of this premise, however. I have found that many, if not most,
Anglo-American residents of Rio have few – if any – direct connections to the lived
structures that are the bones and sinews of empire. Furthermore, there certainly is no
commonality of interest or political allegiance among them. In other words, a significant
part of the Anglo-American presence in Brazil cannot be explained either in terms of
3
tourism or as a direct result of their nations of origins’ political and economic expansion.
In theory, one can describe Anglo-Americans in Rio as an ethnic group in the
Weberian sense of the word in that they are seen and see themselves as a commonly
descended and fairly cohesive collectivity (WEBER, 1991). In practice, however, these
gringos are not so easily distinguished from the (mostly) middle-class Brazilians they move
among, a situation that only intensifies to the degree that they continue living in Rio and
improving their Portuguese. Furthermore, they are a group that is intensely divided by
internal cleavages corresponding to class, social status and – most importantly – their
internal understandings of the meaning of their presence in Rio.
Anglo-Americans, Anglofones, Cariocas and Gringos
For the purposes of this article, “Anglo-American” is intended include English speaking citizens of Great
Britain or any of her former “settler nation” colonies where English is an official language, including – but not
necessarily limited to – the United States, Ireland, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. I deal with
this conglomerate’s relative ethnic unity in the main text. “Anglophone” means an English speaker – of whatever
nationality. “Carioca” means a resident of the city of Rio de Janeiro, of whatever nationality. “Gringo”, if used
on its own without other qualifiers, should be understood in the context of this work to mean an Anglo-American
living in Brazil (I am, of course, aware that Anglo-Americans are not the only “gringos in Brazil). “Brazilian”
means a native born citizen of Brazil who sees himself – and is seen by his co-citizens – as such. In the context of
reporting native testimony, the reader is advised that it generally means Brazilian-born carioca middle-class
residents of the South Zone Rio de Janeiro, as these are the “Brazilians” most “gringos” commonly socialize with.
Thus, while potentially and perhaps theoretically an ethnic group, ethnogenesis –
understood as the (re)production of collective communal identification (SIDER;
DIAMOND,) – is quite weak among Anglo-Americans in Rio de Janeiro. In effect, it
appears to be overwhelmed (but not eliminated) by the particular culture and social
structure of the city environment itself. As Gilberto Velho puts it, "..[P]or mais
significativas e inclusivas que pudessem ser categorias como família e parentesco, bairro e
vizinhança, origem tribal e/ou étnica, grupos de status, estratos e classes sociais, [registrase] circulação, interações sociais associadas à experiências, combinações e identidades
particulares, individualizadas” (VELHO, 1994: 20-21). In other words, class, workplace,
residency and affinities between individual projects tend to unite Anglo-Americans and
Brazilians more than Anglo-Americans shared identity as gringos. Furthermore, gringos
relatively high economic and social status within the city, as well as the fact that most of
4
them are able to return to their countries of origin as required, weaken their need to
ethnically organize in mutual aid associations. In almost all the cases I’ve witnessed,
deeper, more intimate social contacts with Brazilians have been more of a factor in aiding
individual Anglo-Americans in emergencies than their contacts with other gringos.
Furthermore, there is a nationalist, nativist tradition of assimilation in Brazil, which,
in the words of Giralda Seyferth, apprehends the foreigner as a potential threat to
“Brazilianess” that needs to “incorporate the national spirit”, often specifically through
overt tutelage that attempts to reduce his alterity and encourage his adherence to an
ideologically defined national norm (SEYFERTH, 2000: 46-47). If it’s true that gringos
rarely find occasion to salient markers of their identity as an ethnic group (BARTH), this is
partially due to the fact that their Brazilian friends and colleagues give them reason to and,
in fact, applaud their attempts at acculturation the way proud parents applaud an infant’s
first halting steps.
Finally, as I’ve mentioned elsewhere (BLANCHETTE, 2001: 104-105) there exists
among certain gringos a hypervalorization of those things and cultural categories
considered to be “essentially Brazilian”. Demonstrated mastery of these categories is often
a way of achieving status among other gringos. These factors, among others, combine to
create an overall situation where it is often in the individual Anglo-American’s perceived
best interests to play down his alterity and emphasize individual connections to local social
formations. His status as “gringo” still remains present as an ethnic marker, however, an
identitary potentiality or an accusatory category that may be reactivated at any moment.
Thus, ethnogenesis among Anglo-Americans is weakened, it can never be said to disappear
entirely.
Brazilian views of Anglo-Americans as immigrants
In general, Brazilians do not see Anglo-American residents of Brazil as immigrants.
Even those members of the Federal Police in charge of overseeing the flow of foreigners
into and out of the country dismiss the notion that there might be a considerable inflow of
Anglo-American immigrants with a wave of the hand. This is partially due, perhaps, to the
fact that the word “immigrant”, as it’s popularly conceived in Brazil, is associated with the
era of mass migration to the Americas, a period understood (following J. CARNEIRO) to
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have largely ended with the tightening of immigration controls during the Vargas regime of
the thirties.1 In Brazil today, “immigrant” is mostly treated as a historical category with the
notable exception of its use in describing certain contemporary population flows from Asia
and Latin America.2 Within this common sense, historicist, understanding of immigration,
the word’s application to Anglo-Americans is seen as being nonsensical. 3
But a more important impediment to a popular Brazilian understanding of the AngloAmerican presence in Brazil as “immigrant” is today’s view of international population
dislocation as a phenomenon intrinsically linked to the power and prestige of immigrant
sending and receiving countries. As Abdelmalek Sayad would have it:
“O que quer que digam os juristas, não são, assim, a situação individual da pessoa e o
tempo de estadia..., apenas, que fazem a diferença entre um estrangeiro (que está apenas de
passagem) e um imigrante (que se instalou... por mais tempo do que um turista): são
principalmente e antes de mais nada a relação desigual (relação política, econômica, cultural,
etc.), a relação de forças entre... dois países..., duas sociedades..., duas culturas. Considerando as
coisas desse modo, pode-se dizer que o mundo está dividido em dois: de um lado, um mundo
dominante (política e economicamente) que produziria apenas turistas – e todo estrangeiro
oriundo desse mundo poderoso, mesmo se residir em país estrangeiro durante toda sua vida, seria
tratado com o respeito devido a sua qualidade de “estrangeiro” -; de outro lado, um mundo
dominado que só forneceria imigrantes, e todo estrangeiro proveniente desse mundo, mesmo se
vier como turista e só permanecer durante o tempo autorizado ou o tempo atribuído aos turistas, é
considerado como um imigrante virtual ou um “clandestino” virtual.” (SAYAD, 1979 (1): 244). 4
Within the limits imposed by this worldview, the Anglo-American nations cannot
produce immigrants to Brazil because they belong to the “dominant world”, the “first
world”. “Third world” Brazil is condemned to playing host to foreigners – gringos – while
exporting sections of its own population as immigrants who leave in search of work and
better life opportunities in the “first world” (SALES e BAENINGER: 40). This formula
underpins a great deal of the “common sense” understanding of the Brazilian population
flow to the United States, Europe and Japan and prohibits a systematic critique of
1
Some people place the end of this period in the 1950s with the drying up of mass Japanese immigration to
Brazil. (SALLES e BAENINGER: 39)
2
See, for example, BRAGA MARTES, p.21, footnote 1.
3
It’s also apparent in the popular opinion that American immigration to Brazil began and ended with the
founding of Americana. In fact, since 1940, more Americans have entered Brazil “em caráter permanente” in
every 5-year period than in the entire decade long “wave” of Confederate immigration (presuming that 2000
Confederates came to Brazil at that time).
4
See also “O Que é um Imigrante?” p.54, footnote #7.
6
contemporary dislocation from those regions of the planet to Brazil. If we were to break
this understanding down into its most basic precepts, we might state it in the following
fashion: “Brazilians (in mass) emigrate to the First World while First Worlders
(individually) come (temporarily) to Brazil.”
Interestingly enough, however, the “common sense” opinion of population
dislocation between Brazil and the United States is based upon very shaky quantative data.
Though “common sensibly” we know there are many more Brazilians in the United States
(for example) than Americans in Brazil, the numbers we have regarding these presences are
nebulous to the point of non-existence. There’s no solid consensus on the quantity of
Brazilians living within the United States: the numbers range from 94,000 to 1,000,000 and
most data has been provided by sources that do not have the means to carry out accurate
headcounts – the Brazilian Consulate, newspapers, magazines and tourism agencies.
Additionally, these numbers seem to get passed around until they become “received
wisdom”: both Teresa Sales and Ana Cristina Braga Martes report that Boston has around
150,000 Brazilian inhabitants This number has then been repeated by several popular news
sources even though, as Braga Martes herself cautions, the figure is highly questionable
(BRAGA MARTES: 48; SALES; 36).5
Regarding the number of Anglo-Americans in Brazil, things are just as muddled. To
take the case of the Americans, for example, the 1991 census reported 11,360 of them as
resident in Brazil. Veja magazine however, recently claimed that there are some 30,000
Americans living and working in Brazil as contract employees alone. 6 To further
complicate matters, the Ministério de Trabalho estimates that there were only around 5000
Americans in this category of “resident” in 1997.7 Finally, according to a computerized
search in the Brazilian Federal Police’s records carried out on the 29th of August, 2000 by
5
I do not bring these numbers up to criticize the excellent work being done by those of my colleagues who
are researching the flow of Brazilians into the U.S. I merely wish to salient what all researchers studying this
phenomenon agree upon: the number of Brazilians resident in the United States is unknown. See Braga
Martes, p.48. Margolis, pp.15-16.
6
Veja, April 26th, 2000 See also Rodolfo Espinoza’s piece written for the April 2000 issue of Brazzil
Magazine, “Just Passing Through”.
7
Brazil International Monthly Magazine, October 2000. According to Agent Mesquita, the discrepancy
between these two numbers might be partially resolved by the way the contract workers are counted. When
the Federal Police give out a work visa, the entire family of the worker comes along as adjunct on the same
visa. Thus 1 work visa could conceivably cover a number of people (only the visa holder has the right to work
however).
7
agent Ivandro Mesquita8 at my request, 46,077 Americans were listed as “resident”9 in
Brazil (8712 in Rio). Note that all of these numbers assume that few Americans are
“illegally” or irregularly living in Brazil, something almost always assumed in the case of
Brazilians living in the U.S. My field research definitely puts this assumption in doubt.
Depending on the statistics one believes, then, the quantity of Americans living in
Brazil is anywhere from one-half to 1/85th of the number of Brazilians living in the United
States – an immense margin of difference, to be sure. If we accept Agent Mesquita’s
numbers (which – seeing as how they come from the constantly updated database of the
Polícia Federal - are probably fairly accurate) and assume that Ministério das Relações
Exteriores’ estimate of 570,000 Brazilians residents of the U.S. is correct for all practical
purposes, we arrive at the conclusion that around ten times as many Brazilians live in the
United States as Americans live in Brazil.
However, from 1985-1990, some 1,177,820 Americans entered Brazil on tourist visas
as opposed to 1,522,931 Brazilians leaving this country for travel on tourist visas in the
U.S.10 Looking at these numbers, we can see that there is no solid data which a priori
supports the common sense affirmation that along the Brazilian-American axis of
population dislocation Brazil solely exports immigrants and receives tourists while the U.S.
exports tourists and receives immigrants. Substantial numbers of Americans appear to be
living in Brazil while hundreds of thousands of Brazilians are sightseeing in the U.S.
Anglo-Americans and “Assimilation”
The idea that Anglo-American immigration to Brazil is insignificant is also deeply
rooted in Brazilian historiography for a series of reasons, not all of which are explained by
Sayad’s tourist/immigrant dichotomy. Most importantly, there’s a unique Brazilian
tradition of “thinking” immigrants that precludes the inclusion of Anglo-Americans within
this category except in a handful of very sharply defined cases.
8
Names in negrito are pseudonyms used to protect informant anonymity.
This number includes permanent, student, work, cultural, correspondent, religious, and refugee visas. It does
not include tourism, provisional, or business visas or naturalized citizens of Brazil.
10
Data from the IBGE annuários of these years. The basic relationship also doesn't seem to have changed
since then. According to "Brasil em Números, V.2, 1993", 91,471 American tourists came to Brazil as
opposed to 341,126 Brazilian tourists going to the U.S.
9
8
In comparison with the sheer numbers of other nationalities that have entered Brazil –
the Portuguese and Italians, for instance – the Anglo-American presence does pale to
insignificance. Between 1884 and 1984, some 5,129,507 “immigrants” entered Brazil.
87,149 – or 1.70% - of them were Anglo-Americans.11 For this reason, most mention of
immigrants in the Brazilian social sciences generally stick to the 5 principal groups: the
Portuguese, Italians, Spanish, Germans and Japanese 12. This in itself is not enough to
explain the relative disregard with which the Anglo-American presence in Brazil is held,
however. Many equally small ethnic groups (such as the Armenians or Syrians) have
received the attentions of social scientists and the media. Even more telling, these groups
are popularly considered to be integral parts of the “mixture of races” 13 which make up the
nation, a status generally denied the Anglo-Americans.
One reason why the presence of Anglo-Americans in Brazil has been overlooked is
the fact that they founded few settler colonies here. The most successful of these (the one
everyone who touches upon this subject mentions) was, of course, Americana in São Paulo,
supposedly settled by Confederate refugees fleeing the aftermath of the American Civil
War14. Others – in Santarém, Paranagua, Cananeia, Itajaí-Mirim and the Vale do Juquiá
(SEYFERTH, 1988: 37-41; COSTA DE OLIVEIRA: 146; GOLDMAN: 10, 210;
FREYRE, 1948: 65) - are also occasionally mentioned, though their existence was, as a
rule, temporary.
11
The numbers come from the IBGE Anuários from 1935 to 1990. A more detailed breakdown of these
numbers is in Firgues 2 and 3. Of this number, 52,074 (59,75%) were Americans, 33,377 were English
(38.30%) and 1698 (19.50%) were “others” (almost entirely Canadians).
12
For an example of this, see Lambert, Jaques. Os Dois Brasis. 1984 (1971). São Paulo: Companhia Editora
Nacional. pp.60-66. See also Carneiro, J. Fernando, Imigração e Colonização no Brasil. 1950. RJ:
Universidade do Brasil.
13
I’m using this term as an ideological construct, the way that it is used by the Brazilian mass media and by
many – if not most – Brazilians when they reflect upon the composition of their nation.
14
I say “supposedly” because the collection of American settlements that eventually grew into Americana
was not a “planned” affair. Rather, “refugees” from previous American settlements along the coast in São
Paulo and Santa Catarina drifted in to Americana when their settlements failed. There they were joined by
other, non-Confederate, Americans including several “repeat” Irish and German immigrants who’d originally
moved to the U.S. before continuing on to Brazil. To call Americana a “Confederate settlement” is thus to
stretch the meaning of both words. For more information on the founding of Americana and on American
settlers during the years of the Brazilian Empire, see GOLDMAN. Other anthropological studies of the
Americana “colony” include COSTA DE OLIVEIRA, and GUSSI. Books about the colony from a “native”
perspective include MACKNIGHT JONES and HARTER. This last book is especially interesting, not so
much for its views on American immigration and the “Confederado” presence in Brazil as for the author’s
memories of growing up as a Brazilian-American in 1930s Rio de Janeiro and for his exhaustive listing of
famous and influential Brazilian-Americans.
9
The relative success of Americana failed to make much of an impact upon Brazilian
culture as it has been popularly and academically conceived, however. 15 The pattern of
contact and acculturation among the Americans who founded the colony was similar to that
adopted by other immigrants who settled in the same region. According to Emílio Willems,
these people “...entered established currents of internal migration and soon occupied
definite positions in the common social structure,” leading to their eventual absorption by a
social system characterized as industrial, urban and classist. One of the reasons cited by
Willems that this assimilation supposedly proceeded so smoothly in São Paulo was the fact
that most of the immigrants there “brought [with them] cultures closely akin to that of the
native society.” In other words the Italians, Spanish and Portuguese who settled in São
Paulo were Catholic and “Latin” (WILLEMS, 1951: 210-221).16 Though at first glance, this
may seem to exclude Americana’s settlers, it’s worth noting that discussions of Confederate
American immigration to Brazil generally salient the fact that these people supposedly
came here to continue their slave-holding, agrarian life-style.17 In any case, the relatively
small number of Anglo-American settlers combined with their concentration in those
15
The major “cultural influences” generally attributed to the settlers of Americana by mainstream Brazilian
historiography are 1) the introduction of modern, light plows in rural São Paulo, 2) the modernization of
Brazilian orthodontic technique and 3) rock musician Rita Lee Jones. (See Buarque de Holanda, Raízes do
Brasil p. 21 and Caminhos e Fronteiras, p.205 as well as Goldman, pp. 139-145) Eugene C. Harter, however,
claims several other cultural and technical influences for Brazilian-Americans, including the introduction of
the watermelon (Harter, p.110).
16
I am quite aware that this model is showing it’s age. The division between “acculturated” and “assimilated”
nuclei is more than a bit artificial, something Willems recognized when he declared that the “cohesive”
southern nuclei were in fact “hybrid cultures”, made up of elements “transferred” from Europe e “borrowed”
from Brazil (p.215). I repeat Willem’s ideas here not to attempt to breathe new life into old ideologies, but
rather to point out why other extremely "gringo" immigrants (e.g. Germans and Poles) have been historically
seen to have maintained their identities in Brazil while the American colonists of São Paulo are perceived as
having “passed into the melting pot”, so to speak. The general applicability of Willem’s “assimilation” model
to the colonists of Americana is attested to by GUSSI (see pp.117, 152 particularly).
17
This story is apocryphal for several reasons. As mentioned above, many American settlers’ move to Brazil
had nothing at all to do with the fall of Confederacy. Some were even ex-slaves. Furthermore, of the 10,000
Southern refugees who emigrated following the Civil War, a mere 2000 (or 25%) went to Brazil (apparently
New Zealand got quite a few as well...). Of these, more than a thousand soon returned to the United States.
Obviously, the possibility of continuing a slave-holding existence in Brazil was not the only – perhaps not
even the main – thing attracting or repulsing American immigration. (Goldman, ibid, in general but especially
pp.10, 103.) However, the “Confederados” maintained a myth of the founding of Americana that emphasized
their unwillingness to accept post-reconstruction America. An integral part of this ideology was the
valorization of characteristics such as “romanticism, dignity, fanatic family cohesion, the love of courage and
sentimental snobbery” (HARTER: 102)
10
regions most propitious for their absorption has helped to almost erase their existence from
public memory. 18
The number of Anglo-Americans entering Brazil as “immigrants” has been relatively
constant since the mid 19th century, however. It’s significance is especially salient in those
moments of Brazilian history (such as during and after the Second World War) in which the
flow of the “big 5” immigrant groups has been interrupted. Even in those years when there
has been massive inflow from the “big 5”, the U.S. and/or the U.K. have often been among
the top 10 immigrant nations. This has led to a situation in which students of migration in
Brazil have been forced to explain the Anglo-American presence in one way or another.
The following selection from Demografia Brasileira by Paul Hugon is typical of the
explanations that are given:
“Trata-se, na maioria dos casos, de entradas de especialistas, operários e contramestres,
que acompanham as máquinas importadas para a instalação de usinas nacionais ou de usinas
filiais de sociedades americanas, como Ford e General Motors, no estado de São Paulo. Pode-se
duvidar que se trate, nesse caso, de verdadeiros imigrantes. Sua permanência no país é,
provavelmente, limitada ao cumprimento de uma tarefa determinada” (HUGON: 97-98). 19
Hugon’s explanation, though certainly attractive from a “common sense” point of
view, is undermined by the very data that he provides on this phenomenon. In 1963, for
example, Hugon lists 971 Americans as having entered into Brazil, a number which is
confirmed in the IBGE’s Anuário Estatístico do Brasil –1965 on page 71 under the heading
“Imigrantes entrando no Brasil, por nacionalidade, segundo vários aspectos.” On the very
next page, however, one finds another, clearly separate table labeled “Estrangeiros entrados
no Brasil, em caráter temporário, segundo os locais de desembarque, por unidades da
federação”. In this, the categories that are explicitly listed as “temporary” include “pessoas
em viagem de negócios” and “técnicos e professores contratados” – classifications meant to
include the type of “immigrant” which Hugon talks about.20
In Imigração e Colonização no Brasil, J.F. Carneiro states his belief that even though
the entry of American into Brazil was meaningful in terms of numbers, they were not a
18
For a general critique on Willem’s views on “assimilation”, see SEYFERTH, 2000.
Hugon is speaking exclusively of Americans in this paragraph, but his views are typical of those generally
expressed regarding immigration of the other anglophone nationalities as well.
20
Obviously, one cannot determine exactly what an individual is doing in Brazil based on visa classifications
alone. It is quite possible that many workers brought into Brazil by Ford or other companies were given
19
11
significant immigrant group because “pequeno tem sido seu coeficiente de fixação.”
Nonetheless, Carneiro then goes on to admit that “claro que não nos referimos, sob este
ponto de vista, aos norte-americanos que para aqui emigraram logo depois da Guerra de
Secessão... os quais, efetivamente, aqui se radicaram...” (CARNEIRO: 63). In their studies
of Confederate immigration, both Costa de Oliveira (pp.141-145) and Goldman (p.103)
estimate that large numbers of the “Confederados” – up to 50% perhaps – returned to the
United States within a few years of arrival in Brazil. However, “traditional” immigrant
groups may have had a very much lower rate of “fixation” in Brazil than is commonly
believed. Willems estimates that the return rate of German immigrants was over 49%
(WILLEMS, 1946: 66). Given this, one wonders exactly what degree of “não fixação” a
group would need in order for it to be declassified as “immigrant” in Dr. Carneiro’s eyes.
Even such an authority as Sergio Buarque de Holanda has downplayed the AngloAmerican presence in Brazil. In Impressões do Brasil no Século XX, he had this to say
about the English:
Etnicamente, a sua influência é quase nula, sendo raros os casamentos de ingleses fora
da colônia. Eles formam uma sociedade a parte, com seus clubs esportivos e de diversões, com
seus hábitos e trajes, sem ao menos adquiririem regularmente a lingua do país, mesmo após de
longos anos de permanência... No Rio de Janeiro, só vivem na Tijuca, em Santa Tereza,
Laranjeiras ou Flamengo... Se a influência étnica dos ingleses é quase nula, a sua influência
social, apesar do reduzido número, é considerável.21
Buarque de Holanda’s views on the English betray certain concepts that further
disqualify Anglo-Americans as immigrants. These concepts are rooted in Brazilian
ideologies of immigration that have historically been interlinked with theories of racial
intermixture and cultural assimilation – a subject which Brazilian immigration scholar
Giralda Seyferth has extensively explored 22. According to Seyferth the ideal immigrant to
Brazil has traditionally been envisioned as white, peasant or artisan, sober, malable and
resigned to the role assigned to him by the Brazilian State. (SEYFERTH, 1991:165) Under
the Empire, his role was to act as a “civilizing agent”, filling up the country’s empty spaces
by settling on the agricultural frontier and substituting slave labor with that of his own. By
permanent instead of work visas. It is Hugon’s automatic assumption of this that I object too, especially given
the fact that, if anything, the statistical evidence points to the opposite conclusion.
21
Holanda, Sergio Buarque de. Impressões do Brasil no Século XX. S/d. Quote found in a Presença Britânica
no Brasil: 1808-1914. 1987. Rio de Janeiro: Editora Pau Brasil.
22
SEYFERTH, 1990, 1991, 1985.
12
the turn of the century, however, that role had changed. The immigrant was now to be a sort
of catalyst in the formation of a “Brazilian race.” He was to mix with the local population,
“whitening” it, and in the process lose his earlier cultural and ethnic identification. To the
degree that he refused this role, he was a potential danger to the nation, a former of “ethnic
cysts” which would reproduce “valores estranhos à brasilidade.” 23
Anglo-Americans have been historically concentrated among the upper and middle
classes of coastal, urban Brazil. Furthermore, though there’s no evidence that they
intermarried with Brazilians any less than members of other nations, as relatively wealthy
foreigners they probably tended to keep to themselves. Emílio Willems observed, “There is
little doubt that, so far as urban society is concerned, traditional values brought over by
immigrants and preserved by their descendants found their greatest stronghold in the
middle class.”
“Confined to local interests and closely integrated into the parish and the rather flourishing
associational life of the community, the members of this class found little reward in substituting
new values for traditional ones. Assimilation was not a matter of prestige and of economic or
political interest, at least not so much as in the other strata of the community.... thus, for example,
very few families may be found whose members do not have a fair command of the Portuguese
language; but inside their homes, they may prefer their traditional dialect. Intermarriages are less
common than in other classes...” (WILLEMS, 1951: 220).
Furthermore, Anglo-Americans’ relations to Brazilian power structures have never
been remotely describable as “resigned”. In fact, “arrogant” and “rebellious” are terms that
have frequently been associated with them throughout Brazilian history. 24 Given all this,
they were definitely not ideal immigrants under the ideological model of immigration
traditionally defended by the Brazilian State.
The above attempts to classify Anglo-Americans within the overall framework of
immigration in Brazil beg the question of what exactly is meant by the term “immigrant” in
this context. Abdelmalek Sayad remarks, “Toda presença não-nacional dentro da nação é
pensada como presença necessariamente provisória, mesmo quando esse provisório possa
ser indefinido, possa prolongar-se indefinidamente, criando, desta forma uma presença
23
SEYFERTH, 1996. See also VIANNA, NEIVA and ROMERO for first hand views regarding the role of
immigrants in Brazil during the first half of the twentieth century. The concept of “ethnic cyst” belongs to
Oliveira Vianna.
13
estrangeira permanentemente provisória...” (SAYAD, 2000:20-21) However, as Dr.
Carneiro’s comments above betray, in Brazil immigration has traditionally been thought of
as “imigração de povoamento” rather than “imigração de trabalho”. Within this context, the
concept of “the immigrant” carries overtones of failure and permanency: the immigrant has
somehow failed to build a satisfactory life in his homeland so now he is coming to a
different land to try again. His “impermanency” as an immigrant is not to be resolved by
his return to his homeland, but rather by his assimilation to an idealized Luso-Brazilian
norm.
This is perhaps one of the principal roots of the Brazilian tendency to exclude AngloAmericans from the category of “immigrant”. Ironically enough, many Anglo-Americans in
Brazil have historically been “imigrantes de trabalho” – in general relatively well-paid
technicians or professionals, but work immigrants nonetheless. Because of this, they have
traditionally been seen as temporary visitors and bearers of knowledge and/or capital who
will hopefully leave one or both here when they return to their countries of origin, not as
immigrants.
We can thus see why (with the previously mentioned exception of Americana) the
movement of Anglo-Americans into and out of Brazil has not generally been considered to
be a constitutive part of “o que faz brasil, Brasil”. Traditionally seen as being temporarily
in the country, “de pequeno coeficiente de fixação”, with an ethnic influence that’s “quase
nula” due to their supposed reluctance to marry native Brazilians, Anglo-Americans are
envisioned as transmitters of “social” or “technical” values – not as integral parts of the
racial and cultural mix which makes up Brazil. Their impact has been seen as quite intense
by some authors (something which the above quote by Buarque de Holanda attests to and
which even a cursory reading of Gilberto Freyre’s Os Ingleses no Brasil will confirm25),
and yet, curiously, as somehow detached from their lives as lived in this country. However,
while not considered to be an integral part of Brazil, the Anglo-American presence in
Brazil, particularly in Rio de Janeiro, has been an intense and longstanding one, marked by
24
Since the 1845 Aberdeen Act, at the very least. See also Seyferth’s study of the failed Irish colony in ItajaíMirim (SEYFERTH, 1988), Carl Seidler’s accounts of the Irish during the rebellion of 1828 (SEIDLER: 165180) and Holloway’s history of the police of Rio de Janeiro (HOLLOWAY:127,233).
25
See Chapter 1, but pp.30-32 particularly. Freyre did not consider the ethnic influence of the English to be
quite so “nula”, however, as witness his quotes on p. 77 of Ingleses. It’s also worth mentioning that my
14
a continuous presence and the existence of several ethnic institutions. The fact that
Brazilians do not consider Anglo-Americans to be immigrants has certainly not stopped a
substantial number of them from living their lives, raising their children and dieing here.
Anglo-Americans in the city of Rio de Janeiro
However, Brazilians are not alone in their dismissal of Anglo-Americans as
immigrants: the gringos also rarely see themselves in that role. To understand some of the
reasons why, we shall look at how this presence is shaped and reproduced in Rio de
Janeiro, a city that offers rich research opportunities for a situational approach to the study
of ethnicity, particularly regarding Anglo-Americans in Brazil.
Rio has had a long history of sheltering widely varied and often conflicting identity
groups due, among other factors, to its birth as a European settler colony among conquered
American peoples, its intimate participation in the slave trade and its strategic position
along the Southern Atlantic commercial routes. It's not the purpose of this paper to enter
into great detail regarding Rio de Janeiro as a city, nor the history of Anglo-Americans
within that city. Some basic information is required, however, to situate the reader with
regards to the object of the present study. Following Robert Park's list of "things we want to
know about a city" when attempting to understand the groups that live within it, (PARK:6),
we can say the following about Rio de Janeiro.
Rio is popularly understood as a city perpetually on the edge of urban meltdown.
Much of the city’s apparent infrastructural disorganization is associated with its
phenomenal growth over the last 7 decades, allied with consistent failures or refusals to
extend urban services to the city’s growing contingent of poor and working-class residents.
As Mauricio Abreu has demonstrated, Rio is stretched upon a cross formed by a double
class and status bifurcation, expressed in the popular vernacular as a poor "north zone"
opposed to a rich "south zone" and poor "favelas" set off against rich "condominiums" or,
more generally, the “hill (morro)” vs. the "asphalt". Nevertheless, these generalizations
cannot be understood as simple binaries and are rarely observable "on the ground" in their
pure form. As Velho (1999), Valladares and Abreu have clearly shown, even in the most
highly segregated regions of Rio de Janeiro, vast differentials of wealth, prestige and power
informant Marina, arriving in Rio in 1950 from the colony of Harbin in China, considered marriages between
15
exist among residents and even the largest socio-economic gaps do not prevent the
formation of trans-hierarchical social relationships among the city’s residents. Social action
in the city, then, although often following along highly stratified lines, cannot be
apprehended by the static, stereotypical, dichotomies presented above.
Rio’s growth has been greatly fueled by migration to the city, mostly from other areas
of Brazil (ABREU: 96). Though there are some signs that this internal movement may
finally be beginning to slack off (REZENDE: 12), for the moment, migrants remain a major
part of the city's population. The state of Rio de Janeiro has roughly 12,8 million residents,
some 80% of which have been born in the state, the rest being migrants from elsewhere.
Only 5%, or 125,000, of these migrants are of international origin, the majority of the rest
most likely coming from the impoverished northeastern regions of Brazil. 26
While to be a migrant is thus very much part of the carioca experience, international
migrants, present in the city in significant numbers, are at first glance a very small minority.
Nevertheless, due to Rio’s attractions as a destination for international tourism, foreigners
are commonly encountered throughout the city, especially in the “South Zone” and along
the “asphalt”. Among these people, the dividing line between “just visiting Rio” and “living
here” is a very tenuous one. Foreign travelers or tourists, though initially classified as
outsiders, can very easily pass over to a quasi-native status, especially if they learn
Portuguese, reduce their alterity and engage in primary social relations with native
Brazilians. This state of affairs is reflected in the terms used in the city to classify natives
and migrants. "Carioca", is a label applied rather indiscriminately to anyone who's managed
to achieve a consistent presence in the city, whatever their origin, while "carioca da gema"
is reserved for those cariocas who were born and raised in Rio. Though also potentially
"cariocas", international migrants are also likely to be labeled as "gringos", especially as
and if their physical and social being deviates from what is hegemonically understood to be
"Brazilian" (BLANCHETTE, 2001: 30). “Gringo” is thus a term applied to that which is
manifestly “other” in the carioca urban universe: those who are among us, but not of us.
In this arrangement of identitary labels, some gringos are more gringo than others.
Anglo-Americans, typically white, often with pale eyes and hair, generally with a poor to
English and Brazilians to be “quite common”, at least relative to their occurrence in Harbin...
26
Data concerning the general population and number of migrants in Rio comes from the IBGE website:
www.sidra.ibge.gov.br/bda/popul/default.
16
middling grasp of Portuguese and almost always citizens of nations that are popularly
understood to be imperialist exploiters of Brazil are about as "alter" as one can go on the
gringo scale and thus have a difficult time completely divesting themselves of the label,
even when seen by other residents of the city as "carioca".
In the State of Rio de Janeiro, there are around 15,000 Anglo-American residents, the
vast majority of which are concentrated in and around Guanabara Bay in the cities of Rio
and Niteroi. 4566 of these migrants are British, 8712 are Americans, 816 Canadians and
307 Australians.27 Of course, these statistics are simply ball-park figures and don’t include,
for example, tourists, business travelers, dependants of migrants in Brazil on work visas,
Irish, New Zealanders, South Africans, naturalized citizens of Brazil, nor illegal immigrants
(of which my fieldwork has turned up quite a few). Roughly speaking, the Anglo-American
presence in the city is defined by the following salient characteristics:
1)
It is above all a transnational presence, primarily organized around foreign native
speakers of English and only secondarily their countries of origin.
2)
Many of its manifestations (especially the British ones) in terms of the actual
physical and institutional structures of the city are deeply historical and even
traditional. Most Anglo-American cariocas, however, are unaware of this history
and do not participate in Anglo-American institutions in a coordinated or ethnically
conscious manner. The most frequented gringo spaces in Rio are generally
localized, disconnected from any sort of community and often ephemeral. Among
these, in particular, are certain bars notorious for being “gringo”.
3)
In social terms, it is loosely structured, based upon Anglophone social networks that
are highly mutable, non-specific in terms of nationality and which are everywhere
interpenetrated by Brazilians. Though the gringo members of these networks tend to
separate other gringo members into “those of us who are living here” and “visitors”,
the dividing line between these two categories is actually quite tenuous. This
presence, as a whole, can neither be classified as community nor colony, though it
does contain what might be considered communities and colonies.
4)
It tends to conform to rather than contrast with the Brazilian cariocas around it,
following the greater socio-economic bifurcations apparent in the greater carioca
urban universe. At the same time, it also includes travelers and tourists who are
17
manifestly “other” in carioca eyes.
Anglo-Americans as a relatively unified ethnic field
Within limits, one can quite easily situate Anglo-Americans as a common ethnic
group in Rio de Janeiro. Almost all of my informants unhesitatingly label themselves as
“Canadian”, “British”, “American” or etc. and none use the term “Anglo-American” as an
identifier. However, in actual social life in the city they rarely divide themselves into neat
little groups of “British”, “Americans” or what have you. Even in the most nationally
polarized gatherings (such as the American Society’s Fourth of July Party) one will find a
significant sprinkling of other nationalities. What one really notices in these gatherings –
what really sets these people apart from other members of the carioca urban universe – is
the language they speak when they get together: English.
Whether Brazilian, American, Canadian or Irish, the use of the English language in
carioca settings and their common definition as “gringo” or “estrangeiro” (as opposed to
“brasileiros”) are the major characteristics that define this grouping of people(s). The
football teams “Rio Rebels” and “Rio Soccer” are set apart from others in the city of Rio de
Janeiro because their team languages are English. The Umbrella, a newsletter published by
the British and Commonwealth Society, bills itself as “A publication for the Englishspeaking Community of Rio de Janeiro” and runs the news from the American Society
together with that from the Royal British Legion. It is, of course, printed in English. The
King’s Arms pub, perhaps the most notorious anglophone watering hole in Rio, wears its
transnational anglophonic sympathies right out front: though nominally a British pub, it
flies the flags of Brazil, Scotland, Australia, Canada and the United States as well as the
flag of Great Britain. On any given night in the King’s Arms, one can hear half a dozen
simultaneous conversations in English.
Many Brazilians seem to have a certain difficulty in differentiating between the
anglophonic nationalities. Several of my non-American anglophone informants related that
they were tired of constantly being mistaken for Americans. As Paul, an Irish-Canadian,
says, “If you speak English, Brazilians almost always assume that you’re an American, so
27
Data regarding the number of Anglo-Americans in Rio comes from the Polícia Federal, Rio de Janeiro
office. It is worth noting that these numbers in no way jibe with those presented by the IBGE. Readers thus
are warned to not use the set presented here together with those referent to note #27 to generate statistics.
18
frequently they don’t even bother to ask where you’re from.” To tell the truth however, the
Anglo-Americans also have some trouble telling each other apart as Paul himself admits:
“The other night I was sitting next to this gringa who thought I was an American because of
my Canadian accent. It turns out she’s from the same county where I lived for twelve years
in Ireland!”
One of the major segmentary splits apparent among Rio’s Anglo-Americans is not
national in origin but can best be described as “the U.S.A. vs. the Commonwealth”. Since
the events of the 11th of September, 2001, this divide has seemed to have widened slightly,
with the British, Canadians, Australians and etc. being somewhat more bold in their
criticisms of the United States while the Americans are somewhat less apologetic about
their country of origin. Nevertheless, this split is still very much ideological in nature and
more observed in the breach than in actual conduct: “Brits” will complain about “Yanks”
and vice-versa, but they socialize together without many reservations. Almost every
“Commonwealth” group I’ve run into in Rio contains American members and every group
of “Yanks” I know of has its resident “Brit” or two. Furthermore, this split is not nearly as
radical as that caused by class and personal project, as I will relate below.
The physical structure of the Anglo-American presence in Rio de Janeiro
The Anglo-American presence in Rio de Janeiro has been constant and intense since
the beginning of the 19th century, at the very least, when the British fleet escorted the
Portuguese Crown to exile in the city. Due to its extremely strategic positioning along the
sea routes of the South Atlantic, Rio became an important keystone in the edifice of AngloAmerican maritime might, housing for many years a British naval station and being called
upon by immense numbers of British and American merchant vessels.
English-speaking “pirates, technicians, adventurers, businessmen, missionaries,
governesses, professors and… consuls,” (FREYRE, 1948: 45), not to mention a fair
sprinkling of those individuals whom Hanna Arendt calls “the superfluous men” and the
“scum” of empire (ARENDT: 150-151), have thus been in the streets and buildings (and
especially the bars) of urban Rio de Janeiro for the better part of two centuries. This
presence seems to have had a profound, yet contradictorily ephemeral and disconnected
impact upon the city.
19
Today, the presence of Anglo-Americans in Rio is likewise omnipresent and yet
strangely ephemeral, unquestionably here and yet not seen as really part of here. It is a
disconnected and almost ignored presence whose most formal, traditional institutions are
spread across the metropolitan region and are, at best, only notionally linked to one another.
There is, for example, Christchurch in Botafogo, one of Brazil’s oldest protestant
institutions. Founded by British cariocas in the early 19th century, the church still serves as
something of an Anglo-American cultural center today, though this is far from its only role.
There are the British and American schools, which currently contain an overwhelming
majority of Brazilian students, the old cemitério dos ingleses in Gamboâ, now largely
abandoned to drug traffickers, the Niteroi nursing home for the English-speaking elderly
and the Royal British Legion and the American Society, sister associations founded in the
late 19th/early 20th Centuries to promote the social and professional lives of the AngloAmerican residents of the city.
But participation in or even awareness of the existence of these formal institutions
escapes many, perhaps the vast majority of Rio de Janeiro’s resident gringos. In this,
Anglo-Americans are not atypical as international migrants in Rio for, while there are some
small migrant communities, there is nothing in the city that is comparable to the
ethno/religious ghetto as conceptualized by Louis Wirth. The vast majority of the city’s
foreigners – whatever their nationality – seem to engage with Rio through webs of social
and professional connections of their own forging and not so much through obvious ethnic
networks.
The most common Anglo-American “spaces” found in the carioca urban landscape
are localized, ephemeral and generally not institutionally linked. Typically, a given bar,
restaurant, café, or dance hall achieves a reputation as “a place where gringos hang out”.
Individual cariocas will then seek out or avoid this locale, depending on whether they wish
to pursue or shun the company of Anglophone foreigners. Teachers will tell their students
that it’s a good place to practice their English. The place’s address and various reviews of it
will appear on English-language internet sites devoted to travel and tourism, such as the
Lonely Planet’s “Thorn Tree”. Almost inevitably, if the place attracts many gringo
travelers, it will gain a certain reputation – justified or not – as meeting point for sexual
tourists and the people who service them and many gringo residents of the city will start to
20
avoid it, not wishing to be associated with “those kinds of gringos.” Eventually, most of
these “gringo spaces” disappear, and Anglophone sociability will move to another location.
In other words, in Rio de Janeiro, the majority of notorious Anglo-American ethnic
spaces appear and disappear organically as the result of sociability between Anglophones.
Even those that have managed to maintain a reputation as “gringo spaces” over the long run
will suffer large fluxes in the number of Anglo-Americans that frequent them.
As a whole, then, the Anglo-American presence in Rio de Janeiro does not form a
cohesive enough grouping to be labeled a “community” or a “colony” though,
unquestionably, there are several gringo communities and colonies in Rio. Furthermore, as
I’ve mentioned above, carioca Anglo-Americans rarely unite along national lines:
knowledge of the English language and status as a foreigner seems to be the major
agglutinating factors at work when gringos socialize together and the ethno-national
frontier that is consistently emphasized in these groups is between “gringo” and
“Brazilian”. Finally, as a corollary to the above, Brazilian born cariocas, often Anglophones
themselves, are almost always present in Anglo-American social groupings in the city, if
only as spouses or boy/girlfriends.
The social structure of the Anglo-American presence in Rio de Janeiro
The most common social formation on display in this universe might usefully be
apprehended as a network in the sense given to that term by Elizabeth Bott: an amorphous,
non-mutual series of linkages stemming away from a central social nucleus and which
cannot be surrounded by a common boundary (BOTT: 142). Bott most famously uses this
formation to describe families’ insertions into the urban social universe. In the case of
Anglo-Americans in Rio, such a cohesive “core” unit as a family is rarely apparent as most
gringos come to the city as individuals or, at most, couples. Instead, friends, coworkers and
households tend to make up the core social groupings whose membership is both informal
and in constant flux. These groupings, which might themselves be better classified as
highly connected networks (following Bott’s terminology) rather than cohesive groups with
common aims, independent roles and distinctive subcultures (Ibid, idem), are nested within
larger, more dispersed networks.
21
How these networks look and interact in practice can be exemplified by a situation I
observed one evening at King’s Arms, where I encountered three different tables of gringos
drinking and socializing. The first table was mostly made up of contract workers in the
petroleum industry. At the second table, I found several English teachers. The third table
was occupied by a band of British sailors off of a frigate recently called up from the
Malvinas to participate in Brazil’s 500 th anniversary celebration. At all three tables,
Anglophone Brazilians were present but only at the sailors’ table were the gringos all from
one country.
Each table represented a fairly highly connected social network, but only the sailors
could legitimately be called a group, in the strict sense of the term. The structure of the first
two networks (the only ones I was able to observe fairly closely) is represented in Figure 1.
Note that while the connections linking the individuals at each table are fairly dense,
only two links exist between tables. 2H, a Canadian English teacher, knew some of the
sailors because his Anglophone football club plays the crew of the frigate whenever it is in
port. 2F, an American petroleum worker, was accompanying 2E on a date. 2F worked at the
same company as 1F, whom he knew as an American executive who was on a tour of the
company’s Rio de Janeiro operation. I was to observe the group at the second table together
on several other occasions during my trips to the field, though it never reformed quite
exactly in this configuration again. Although I frequently found these people socializing
together, when I interviewed its individual members, none of them thought that a group,
per se, existed. 2H classified 2C and 2D as friends – the rest of the group were “just
acquaintances”. 2B classified herself as a friend of everybody at the table except 2E, 2F and
2G (whom she had never met before) and she was just beginning a sexual relationship with
2A. None of the people at the table that night were members of who she classified as her
“galera”, however. 2I and 2A were housemates. 2I also knew 2B and 2H but 2A, new in
town, was only acquainted with 2I and 2B. 2G and 2E were co-workers and both had met
2H at certain kiosk on Ipanema beach well known as another “gringos hang out”. 4 other
gringos not present at the table that evening also frequented the same kiosk on weekends
and were acquainted with almost everyone at the table.
Another characteristic typical of Anglophone social networks in Rio is that tables 1
and 2 contained both gringos who were considered “residents” of Rio as well as those who
22
were “visiting”. In the case of the group at table 2 (which I followed quite closely), two
years after these observations were made, only four of the six gringos present still remained
in Rio and two of these had completely discontinued sociability with the other gringo
members of the network.
Though most Anglo-American groupings in Rio seem to follow the patterns described
above, there are some social networks that are tight enough to definitely be called
“communities”, if not “colonies”. This is perhaps the case of the groups surrounding the
Royal British Legion and the American Society, many of whose members socialize
together, worship at the same churches, participate in the same charities and send their
children to the same schools. It appears that the core group of these networks is made up of
long-term Anglo-American residents of Rio de Janeiro and their (often Brazilian) spouses,
while the majority of group members are temporary residents of the city, often here on job
assignments (“expatriates”, of whom I will speak more about below). Thus, even though
these groups are structurally stable, their actual composition is liable to vary wildly over
time.
Gringo conformity to carioca socio-economic divides
In economic terms, Anglo-American residents of Rio de Janeiro are generally on the
opposite end of the migrant spectrum from the often-penniless northeasterners understood
to be the city's "typical" migrants. However, the apparent comparative wealth of the gringo
vis a vis other cariocas is greatly reduced by the city’s overall social structure and the
particular formation of the constellation of Anglo-American social and economic networks
in Rio as they interact with and within this structure.
The double bifurcation of carioca society into north/south, hill/asphalt is, perhaps, the
consummate carioca “native category” and gringos everywhere in the city recognize and
reproduce this category. Within this view of things, Anglo-Americans generally situate
themselves and are situated by others towards the "South Zone" and "asphalt" ends of the
carioca social spectrum. It's rare to find a gringo in Rio who makes less than a 1000 reais a
month, a salary achieved by a small percentage of cariocas. Furthermore, gringos rarely live
north of the neighborhood of Santa Teresa. Most of their residences are concentrated in the
neighborhoods of Botafogo, Leblon, São Conrado, Ipanema, Copacabana and Barra da
23
Tijuca.
Interestingly enough, the last three of these neighborhoods also concentrate a large
proportion of the carioca middle and upper classes. Thus, while living in a relatively
privileged position when compared to cariocas globally, Anglo-American gringos are
generally no better and are often worse off economically than the Brazilian-born caricoas
with whom they live and principally associate.
There is, of course, a third major group that most definitely makes up the majority of
the gringos in the Rio de Janeiro: Anglo-American tourists and travelers. As Park points
out (1967:1-2), a city's character can be defined to a certain degree upon the kinds of
occupations and professions that it encourages. For reasons ranging from the purely
physical (extreme natural beauty, tropical climate and excellent beaches) to the political
and economic (its strategic location along traditional sea and air routes of travel in the
South Atlantic), Rio de Janeiro has been hosting large numbers of itinerant international
travelers for perhaps longer any other city in the Western hemisphere (CASTRO: 1999),
and tourism related economic and social niches are legion in the city.
From the point of view of the city’s residents, however, tourists only “count” insofar
as they interact with cariocas. Being that the vast majority of tourists do not speak
Portuguese, this interaction is highly limited unless and until the tourist manages to attach
himself to a bilingual carioca. Furthermore, tourists are typically housed in a relatively
restricted section of the city, the beachfront hotels of Copacabana, Ipanema and Leblon.
Thus, while outnumbering Rio’s gringo residents by a factor of ten or more, gringo tourists
are actually a rather minor element in the city’s social life, generally participating in it only
insofar as they’ve managed to integrate themselves with one of the Anglophone social
networks, native or gringo, present in the city.
“Locals” and “Expats”
As I’ve mentioned above, one certainly can’t speak of a “gringo community” in Rio
as there are in fact several different, mostly separate webs of anglophonic sociability. In my
time in the field I was able to partially explore two of what I feel are the most important
these, which I’ve somewhat arbitrarily labeled “locals” (because members of this group
24
generally describe themselves as “local gringos” or “foreigners living in Rio”) and “expats”
(because the members of this ground generally call themselves “expatriates”). These two
are by no means the only ones to be found, and I’d like to clarify that the categorizations I
present here are not exhaustive or exclusive. There are other anglophonic webs of sociablity
in Rio de Janeiro that I’ve not yet explored. For example, ONG workers and students
gravitate towards the “locals” when they socialize with other gringos but also generate their
own, mostly separate social circles based upon their host universities, universities of origin,
or political affinities. Likewise, there’s a major split between “field” and “office” contract
workers within the “expat” circle, with the second type being more represented within that
web of sociability. 28
As a rule, the division between “locals” and “expats” is perceived by very few of my
informants. Most individual anglophone foreigners generally stick to one of these webs and
basically ignore the existence of the other. There are individuals, groups and places that
belong to both webs of sociability, however. Teachers at the various English institutes or at
the American or British schools may socialize within one or the other webs. Paul, an
English teacher who principally mixes with “locals”, also cultivates a wide range of friends
in expat circles. Likewise, certain “gringo spaces” like the King’s Arms in Ipanema might
contain representative groups of both webs on any given night, as we’ve seen above. These
rare points of contact only tend to emphasize the general separateness of the two webs,
however. The model of social interaction at the King’s Arms that I presented typifies the
linkages of these social networks. What one immediately notices here is the relative paucity
of contacts between groups – a sparseness that repeats itself throughout the gringo presence
in Rio. On one occasion during my fieldwork, for example, I attended two parties – a
birthday party for an English teacher at a notorious “gringo house” in Vidigal, and the
28
Daniel, an American who came to Rio 15 years ago as a contract worker in the petroleum industry
describes this split in the following manner: “Field workers tend to work in a rhythm of two months on, one
month off. When they’re working they are constantly in the field, on site, working 12 hours a day. When
they’re off, a lot of them go home to the countries they came from. Consequently, they don’t see much of
Brazil: only 2-3 days when they’re coming on or off a shift. That’s when they’re in contact with Brazilian
culture, which for them is basically Copa and the whore bars... Field workers often don’t have any contact
with their company’s office personnel.... Field workers, as a rule, are more liberal, more rowdy and less
formally educated. There’s kind of a yuppie/redneck divide going on between the field and office workers
though this isn’t always the case, of course... Office workers have a more constant presence in Rio. The
company maintains apartments for them in the city or pays them a housing stipend. They work long hours, but
generally get the weekends off and can participate in the city’s nightlife... Office people are surrounded by
Brazilian culture but most don’t adapt to it very well.”
25
American Society of Rio de Janeiro’s 4th of July celebration at the Sheraton Hotel, also in
Vidigal. Though the events were well known in their respective Anglo-American social
circles and were hosted literally a stone’s throw away from each other, no gringo (other
than myself) attended - or as far as I know even heard about – both events.
Though a given gringo may frequent one or another anglophonic web of sociability,
this does not mean that he does not also participate in Brazilian webs of sociability. As a
rule, most people seem to have “gringo friends” and “Brazilian friends” – these two
categories may or may not intermix. There are many gringos who do not frequent any web
of anglophonic sociability at all. In these cases, Brazilian webs of sociability form the
predominant circles in which the individual travels, though he may occasionally frequent
one or another anglophonic circle for brief periods. For example, Jack, an American in his
40s who’s lived in Brazil for almost 30 years, told me “I really never socialize with other
Americans.” He bought a raffle ticket for the 2000 American Society 4th of July, however,
as one of his colleagues at the English institute where he works is “a big supporter of the
event,” and he also gave me several useful contacts in the “expat” social circle.
Over the years, an individual gringo may pass back and forth between several webs of
sociability. The case of one American I met on the beach in Ipanema is illustrative as to
how complicated an individual gringo's history of sociability in Brazil may be. This young
man originally came into Rio as a “traveler” on a tourist visa. He later upgraded to a student
visa in order to stay in the country, achieving this status through paying for an advanced
Portuguese course. During this time, he socialized principally with local gringos. Finally,
he returned to the U.S., finished his degree got an M.B.A. and came back to Brazil as a
contract worker (with a work visa) for a multinational corporation in São Paulo. At the
moment I met him, he was in Rio to spend some time with his old “local” gringo friends.
He told me that he rarely socialized with gringos in São Paulo and was seriously
considering marrying his girlfriend in order to get a permanent visa. Living with his
Brazilian girlfriend was decreasing the importance of the gringo social networks in his life.
Within a few years, it’s quite possible that this young man will become a “bom imigrante”
without ever consciously trying for that status. It would not surprise me, however, if his job
took him into frequent contact with the “expat” web of sociability in São Paulo, despite his
personal wishes.
26
The principal web of anglophonic sociability which I investigated in Rio de Janeiro,
“the locals”, consists of gringos who are “living their lives” here in the sense that they do
not see their stay as short-term, thus differentiating themselves from tourists. Within this
web, the people I encountered tend to classify themselves as “travelers” or “local
foreigners”, though the dividing line between these two categories is nebulous, at best,
being that after a few months residence in the city, many travelers stay on in Rio, often
illegally, improving their Portuguese and becoming locals. Most of these people have a
university level education with the vast majority of them possessing the equivalent of a
Bachelors of Arts degree. Individuals who work are generally involved in some way or
another with the English language – either as teachers, translators or journalists. 29 The
principle characteristic that these people have in common is that they view their presence in
Brazil as an end in itself rather than a means to an end.
The second web – the “expats” – is also made up of anglophonic foreigners who see
their lives in Rio as stretching beyond the purely short-term. However, though these people
might be “living their lives in Brazil”, their principal social, economic and cultural
references are foreign or transnational. Again, most of the individuals in this group have a
university level education, the most common degrees being in technology, engineering, or
administration. Workers in this group tend to be well-paid professionals in administration
or fields relating to high technology – particularly petroleum exploration and
telecommunications. The principal characteristic of this group is that they see their stay in
Brazil as part of a larger project, generally involving a career. Brazil just happens to be
where their job is at the moment. This is the Paul Hugon’s class of “especialistas, operários
e contramestres” who come to Brazil to fulfill a determined economic function.
The difference between locals and expats seems to revolve around income and
attitude. Expats are well paid for their work (even by their home country’s standards) while
locals live in Rio in spite of perhaps having better paying job opportunities elsewhere.
Expats can often be found living in Leblon, São Conrado, Lagoa and Barra da Tijuca while
locals generally live in Copacabana, Botafogo, Flamengo, Gloria, Catete and Santa Teresa.
Ipanema is a neighborhood that seems to concentrate both groups equally.
29
One might also include certain teachers at the British or American schools within this category. The
characteristic which principally separates them from their Brazilian colleagues is the fact that they were hired
as “native speaking” teachers for classrooms where subjects are taught in English.
27
Daniel, an American who worked for several years in the petroleum industry in
Brazil before marrying a carioca and “retiring” to Teresopolis has the following to say
about expatriate office workers in his old company:
“Maybe 70% still see Brazil as being weird and exotic, even after living here for years....
Out of the 20-30% who adapt, maybe 5% ‘go native’, which is basically what happened to me.
Many of the rest end up marrying Brazilians and going back to the States. Usually their wives
don’t adapt well - they don’t learn English and they end up getting mean and ornery - and they
get divorced shortly after.... Americans working for multinationals in Brazil make lots of extra
cash, bonuses up to 20-30%. And money goes a lot farther here, too. When they get back to the
States, their Brazilian wives become surprised when they’re suddenly demoted to the working
class....”
Daniel’s comments point out that expatriates in the petroleum industry receive
bonuses in order to induce subjection to work in Brazil. By contrast, several of the teachers
I met who worked at the British or American schools took substantial wage cuts in order to
receive the privilege of teaching in Rio. In short, locals work in order to live in Rio while
expats live in Rio in order to work. This is, of course, an ideal typification. Most locals
aspire to jobs that will allow them to live in Brazil while earning salaries commensurate to
what they’d receive for similar work in their countries of origin. Likewise, most expats
have a choice as to whether or not their company will send them to Brazil.
It would be wrong to claim that either group is more “acculturated” than the other.
Both locals and expats share many of the characteristics and habits of the Brazilians who
surround them and when they socialize with Brazilians, they are likely to be found with
Brazilians of class and status backgrounds similar to their own, with the expats generally
socializing with a higher class of natives than the locals. That said, there does seem to be an
“attitudinal” divide which lies between locals and expats and which might best be described
– as Daniel does, above – as willingness "to go native”. Expats are similar to the
stereotypical Anglo-American “non-immigrant” as defined by Carneiro, Hugon and others
in that they see themselves as being here to do a set job, after which they expect to leave.
They hope to have a good time while they are here, but enjoying Rio de Janeiro is not a
prerequisite to their continued presence in the city. "Understanding Brazil” is not a major
expat project: it is with the local gringos. In short, expats appear to be people who for better
or worse have established themselves in their societies of origin while locals seem to be
somewhat at odds with these societies and are searching for other paradigms. This
28
perception is shared by many of my informants. One night while discussing English
teachers in Rio and the general net of sociability surrounding them, Jan, a 38 year old
Englishman who’s lived 5 years in Brazil described local gringos (particularly English
teachers) as "Brazilophiles... who drop here and go ‘Oh...!’ You know, they go through a
period of saying ‘This is all that was missing from the culture of my society!’ They're
searching for something."
“Local” acculturation and the search for the exotic
When locals engage in contests of status among themselves, one of the major axis
around which competition turns is what could be called “comparative assimilation”. In
other words, locals frequently try to “out Brazilian” one another by staying away from
things classified as belonging to “the United States” (Barra da Tijuca stands out particularly
in this regard). This leads to the valorization of things considered to be “truly Brazilian”,
which tend to be those things that are most exotic from the Anglo-American point of view,
generally phenomena and people ideologically associated with the African, Indian and
especially the poor (or “underdeveloped” or “non-western” – favored gringo euphemisms)
poles of Brazil. Demonstrated mastery of these symbols becomes a shorthand way of
proving one’s credentials as one who can “blend in”.
Conspicuously absent from locals' discourses about Brazil, however, are several
native categories many Brazilians consider to be “essentially Brazilian”. In other words,
locals see samba, forró, or bossa nova as representing “Brazil” – not the music of Villa
Lobos or Legião Urbana. Umbanda is Brazilian but Pentecostal churches like the
“Assembléia de Deus” aren’t. The favelas are Brazilian but not “the condominiums (and
certainly not Barra da Tijuca...) Locals tend to read popular novels about the destruction of
the Amazon rainforest, not Casa Grande e Senzala or the works of Guimarães Rosa.
Furthermore, the local ethic is essentially experientialist. Bibliographic or academic study
is largely absent from their discourses as a means through which one might acquire
knowledge of Brazil. Apparently, one does not read about Brazil – one lives it.
An explanation for this mindset can perhaps be found in what Adam Kuper sees as an
increased emphasis on “cultural studies” in the social sciences, especially in the United
States and Britain. As Kuper would have it “...official high culture is [seen as] suspect, and
29
mass-produced culture condemned as ersatz, if not irredeemably corrupt,... but popular
culture is treated sympathetically” when seen through the lens of cultural studies (KUPER:
229). Given the fact that almost all of the local gringos I’ve met and interviewed are college
educated, mostly within the arts and human sciences, it’s perhaps not surprising that the
views many of them express regarding “Brazilian culture” seem to favor popular cultural
forms. In this sense, cultural artifacts such as “samba” and “capoeira” represent the “real”
Brazil as they are generally seen as organic expressions of popular culture whose locus is
believed to be the favela. Cultural works such as those of Guimarães Rosa and Villa Lobos
are not seen as “really Brazilian” because, as one gringo told me, “How many Brazilians
read or listen to that stuff?” Likewise, things like telenovelas, middle class shopping centers
and Barra da Tijuca are dismissed as “consumerist crap” (or – worse yet –the effects of
“Americanization”, regarding which, see Kuper’s comments on p.232 of Culture.).
The “cultural studies” explanation does not quite cover all bases, however: very few
Anglo-Americans have pointed out pagode or pentecostal churches to me as being “really
Brazilian”, even though these are indisputably manifestations of popular culture on display
in many favelas. To be “really Brazilian” then, culture must exotic as well as popular; two
attributes which the favela seems to reunite in the eyes of many – if not most – gringos.
This, to me, strikes at one of the key underpinnings of local understandings of Brazil
and their place within it. While most locals I’ve met claim to be staunch anti-imperialists
and are quite critical of their societies of origin, one can’t escape the feeling that many of
them are at least partially following in the footsteps of colonial explorer. As critics of
imperialism such as Pratt and Said have pointed out, one of the key processes of the
classical imperial project was an ordering of perceptions of the landscape – both social and
physical – of the periphery according to metropolitan categories and desires, in which the
bluntly “other” was configured as the centerpiece of attention. Furthermore, the locals’
desire to “pass” for Brazilian often seems to mimic certain stock images of pulp fiction, in
which dashing young adventurers pass themselves off as natives, the better to carry out
their own (often imperially linked) projects. Following this imagery, one is struck by the
fact that the best imperialists in these stories’ unabashedly jingoistic plots are often those
30
who are purportedly able to manipulate native languages and cultural categories as good as
or better than the natives themselves.30
It would be naive to claim that locals are following hidden imperialist agendas in
their interrelations with Brazil. However, it would be equally naive to assume that the
adventure literature and imagery of their childhood (and many of my local informants have
talked at length with me about how they fantasized as children of visiting far-off, exotic
lands) has not had some effect upon how they understand and interact with the world.
Whatever the underlying reasons, for our purposes here, it is enough to remark upon the
fact that “passing for Brazilian” and “not needing gringo friends” are common local
projects which, for better or worse, tend to eventually push them almost exclusively into
Brazilian webs of sociability. One of the most common things I’ve heard long-term local
gringo residents of Rio de Janeiro say31 (usually quite proudly) is “I don’t have any gringo
friends at all. I barely ever speak English.”
Conclusion: Anglo-Americans as an occasional ethnic group
The general situation delineated above means that, while ideologically situated by
themselves and others as a commonly descended collectivity, the Anglo-Americans of Rio
are anything but a cohesive presence, except in purely occasional and ephemeral
circumstances. The major split that strikes across potential ethnic cohesiveness is class and
project based. Locals and expats rarely interact together and, in fact, there seems to be a
good deal of mutual discomfort that springs up on those rare occasions in which members
of the two social networks must deal with each other. The stereotype that one might hear
enunciated on these occasions by locals is that the expats “don’t know anything about this
country and are only here to make their money off of it and leave.” One might hear expats,
on the other hand, classifying locals as “losers who couldn’t get a job back home so they
came here”. In practice, however, locals and expats rarely show this sort of animosity
towards each other, as they tend to circulate in two almost separate social universes.
Even within their particular social networks, however, both locals and expats have
solid reasons for avoiding ethnic frontier maintenance while in Brazil.
30
31
Indiana Jones is, of course, the most widely recognizable of these characters.
And, it must be admitted, a phrase that I myself frequently uttered before embarking upon this project...
31
Expats, often concretely linked to personal career projects that tie them into the
structures of power, capital and prestige of their homelands, see their presence in the city as
purely temporary. Though work immigrants of a sort, their relatively high socio-economic
status combines with traditional Brazilian views as to what constitutes an immigrant to
remove them from that category. Furthermore, Brazil is merely one more stop along their
career path and, though they may socialize with other gringos and even utilize certain
traditional Anglo-American institutions while here (such as Christ Church or the American
Society), they do not see such sociability or institutions – as specifically represented in Rio
– as part of their constitutive identities, nor see a need to maintain these in their specificity
over the long term.
Locals, on the other hand, reproduce their physical presence in Rio de Janeiro mostly
through interactions with locally based structures of power, capital and prestige that include
and are often controlled by Brazilians. Furthermore, many of them come to Brazil and stay
here following personal projects that emphasize the successful manipulation of cultural
categories understood to be Brazilian. This places locals in active interaction with
Brazilians in personal trajectories where processes of acculturation – in the sense of
learning new socio-cultural categories without necessarily forgetting the old – typically
become quite intense. Though locals may still socialize with other Anglo-Americans, their
concrete possibilities for social ascension in Brazil are almost entirely tied up with their
ability to speak (and, more importantly, to read and write) Portuguese and to navigate
Brazilian social circles. For those who are unwilling or unable to do this, the English
teaching and translating market provides a reasonable enough standard of living and, in
times of economic crisis, a hasty retreat can always be beaten back to the more forgiving
labor markets of the country of origin. There are thus few impulses for local AngloAmericans to engage in the construction of ethnic mutual aid associations. For this reason,
perhaps, almost the only “ethnic” organizations one sees locals engaged in are those related
to leisure: football teams and drinking societies.
From the Brazilian point of view, non-tourist Anglo-Americans are generally present
throughout the South Zone of Rio de Janeiro and integrated into the vast constellation of
social scenes observable in the city to the same degree and in much the same ways as the
Brazilian-born middle and upper classes. Following, often unconsciously, ideologies of
32
assimilation historically present in considerations of Brazilian national identity, Brazilians
often interpret their Anglo-American associates’ reduction of alterity as a mark of that
particular gringo’s “Brazilianess”. What could thus be ideologically situated as an extreme
ethnic division between “Brazilian” and “Anglo-American” is often, in practice, reduced to
an accent.
In Rio de Janeiro, then, on both sides of the potential ethnic divide, processes are at
work that reduce, but do not entirely eliminate, Anglo-American ethnogenesis. For
completely different reasons, both sides see assimilation – understood here as gringos
learning Portuguese, reducing their cultural alterity and forging primary social relationships
with Brazilians – to be a desirable thing. This is particularly true among those AngloAmericans who tend to maintain a long-term presence in the city as residents. This
situation, far from producing collective ethnic communal identification, tends to recreate
Anglo-American status as a manifestly identifiable group that is both omnipresent in
carioca affairs and yet strangely unreal, not quite part of the mix “which makes brazil,
Brazil”.
33
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35
36
37
Figura 2 – Anglo-Americanos entrando no Brasil em caráter “permanente”: 1884-1984
Permanentes
Americanos
Ingleses
Outros
1884-93
1894-1903
1904-13
1914-23
1924-33
1935-39
1940-44
1945-49
1950-54
1955-59
1960-64
1965-69
1970-74
1975-79
1980-84
Total
649
2664
2949
1898
2556
1293
3795
3830
5762
6862
5025
5435
6066
2788
502
0,07%
0,31%
0,29%
0,38%
0,35%
1,28%
11,26%
4,77%
1,72%
2,77%
3,37%
9,51%
10,26%
4,79%
3,32%
2870
825
6710
3964
5829
1635
475
1566
2080
1905
695
1302
2046
1174
301
0,32%
0,10%
0,67%
0,79%
0,79%
1,62%
1,41%
1,95%
0,62%
0,77%
0,47%
2,28%
3,46%
2,02%
1,99%
n.d.
n.d.
n.d.
n.d.
n.d
33
n.d.
52074
1,02%
33377
0,65%
1698
0,03%
0,03%
(CA,AS,NZ,IR,SA)
Anglo-Amer.,
Total
Permanentes
Total
123
245
406
75
505
226
118
0,15%
0,07%
0,16%
0,05%
0,88%
0,38%
0,20%
3519
3489
9659
5862
8385
2961
4270
5519
8087
9173
5795
7242
8338
4080
803
0,40%
0,40%
0,96%
1,16%
1,14%
2,93%
12,67%
6,87%
2,42%
3,70%
3,89%
12,67%
14,10%
7,01%
5,32%
883668
862110
1006617
503981
737223
100906
33713
80372
334277
247944
149088
57157
59132
58218
15101
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
87149
1,70%
5129507
100%
1)
Todos os dados aqui referentes vêm dos “Anuários Estatísticos” publicados entre os anos 1935 e 1995.
2)
Os dados para os anos 1884-1933 vêm do "Movimento geral da imigração, 1884-1939", na página 1307 do Anuário do IBGE 1939/1940.
3)
Em 1937, o IBGE lista somente "entradas", sem divisão entre "imigrantes" e "não imigrantes". Para completar o quadro, calculei as porcentagens de ambas categorias baseado
nos resultados dos anos 1935-36 e 1938-39. Em seguida, multipliquei-as pelo total de 1937.
4) Os dados para os anos 1952 e 1953 foram estimados calculados como no “3” acima.
5) Muitos “outros” devem estar escondidos na categoria “diversos” do IBGE. Portanto, os números aqui apresentados para a categoria “outros” são incompletos.
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Figura 3 – Anglo-Americanos entrando Brasil como em caráter “temporário”: 1935-1984
Temporários
1935-1939
1940-1944
1945-1949
1950-1954
1960-1964
1965-1969
1970-1974
1975-1979
1980-1984
1985-1989
1990-1994
16944
50,22%
2181
6,46%
(CA,AS,NZ,IR,SA)
11810
8,18%
8759
6,07%
224
0,16%
34441
25,34%
6928
5,10%
916
0,67%
15087
21,53%
2851
4,07%
444
0,63%
16205
15,22%
1795
1,69%
1250
1,17%
172309
23,60%
61553
8,43%
14464
1,98%
329779
19,31%
46573
2,73%
49056
2,87%
535287
14,97%
95151
2,66%
102850
2,88%
771619
10,80%
121464
1,70%
171355
2,40%
1057506
12,09%
172676
1,97%
215259
2,46%
571257
8,17%
119658
1,71%
133642
1,91%
Anglo-Amer.
Total
Permanentes,
Total
20793
14,40%
144406
100%
19125
56,69%
33739
100%
42285
31,12%
135893
100%
18382
26,24%
70066
100%
19250
18,08%
106446
100%
248326
34,01%
730056
100%
425408
24,91%
1707513
100%
733288
20,51%
3574644
100%
1064438
14,89%
7146389
100%
1445441
16,53%
8744962
100%
824557
11,79%
6996288
100%
Americanos
Ingleses
Outros
1)
1955-1959
Todos os dados aqui referentes vêm dos “Anuários Estatísticos” publicados entre os anos 1935 e 1995.
2) Não existem dados para os anos entre 1954 e 1963.
3) Em 1963 –1970 e 1976-1994, somente o número de turistas que entraram no Brasil aparece aqui.
39