Talk:Slavery in Brazil

Unclear sentence in first paragraph

"The importation of African slaves began midway through the 16th century, but the enslavement of indigenous peoples continued well into the 17th and 18th centuries." Why the "but"? I'd attempt to correct the structure of this sentence, but I can't even devine how the information in the two parts relate.AWCzarnik (talk) 03:02, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

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Jesuits were not Bandeirantes!!

If Skidmore actualy says that jesuits were bandeirantes I would suggest not using him in this article at all. See e.g. John Manuel Monteiro, a professor at UNICAMP (his book is NEGROS DA TERRA - Índios e bandeirantes nas origens de São Paulo John Manuel Monteiro). Jesuits, in fact, while forcing indians to live in "aldeamentos", fought against the bandeirantes trying to capture slaves in the guaranitic wars. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.156.92.7 (talk) 22:52, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

I've just checked Skidmore's book and he makes no such claim... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 179.210.193.160 (talk) 00:51, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

Brevity, quality

I'm surprised at the brevity and low quality of this article. Slavery was practiced for a longer period and on a larger scale in Brazil than in the United States. Slave conditions in Brazil were even harsher than in the United States, with death rates that were shockingly high. Given these facts, and given the obvious importance of the topic, this article should be at least as long and as well documented as the excellent article on slavery in the United States. If someone with scholarly expertise on this topic and with a solid grasp of the English language could take a day or two to improve this article, he or she would be doing a great service to Wikipedia readers. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.159.177.65 (talk) 20:57, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

sephardi jews?

The jews from the iberian peninsula were the major slave owners and sugar plantation owners of brazil. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.160.141.90 (talk) 18:07, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

That is a myth created by integralist historians in the 1930's, first of all, judaism was prohibited in Brazil, so all slave owners were practising catholics, secondly, even though you can assume some of the 16th and 17th century slave owners were of jewish origin, the same cannot be said about the following centuries (when the greatest number of african slaves were brought to Brazil) when the fact that you were a new christian was of no importance (and is very difficult to assure). Thirdly, the marranos (the new christians who still had jewish practices) lived mostly in the "sertão", where slavery was almost non-existant. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Knoterification (talk • contribs) 14:30, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

Numbers of slaves

Article mentions numbers of slaves imported per year at various times. Would be useful to know also the numbers of people in slavery for various periods, and the rate of emancipation. Also, didn't the 2nd and last emperor of Brazil play a role in abolishing slavery? (From the article, Pedro II of Brazil: "Pedro steadfastly pushed through the abolition of slavery despite opposition from powerful political and economic interests.") Not mentioned at all in this article. Catrachos (talk) 17:53, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

It's not called the Paraguayan in War in English. It's the War of the Triple Alliance. One gets the idea that this article is written with a view toward making Brazil look somehow "cleaner" in regard to slavery than it really was. Who would want to do this? The descendants of slave owners? Someone with the misguided idea that somehow modern-day Brazil gets a better image by historic revisionism?189.38.128.8 (talk) 12:52, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

I was going to start a new thread on inconsistent numbers, but this thread already existed. From the introduction to the article:

An estimated 4.9 million slaves from Africa came to Brazil during the period from 1501 to 1866.

By the time it was abolished, in 1888, an estimated four million slaves had been imported from Africa to Brazil

What happened to .9 million people in the two intervening paragraphs between these two quotes?? Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:29, 30 March 2017 (UTC)

Gender and slave identities

I am planning on adding a section to this article specifically about women slaves in Brazil: their work, status, and collective identity that was often very different and underrepresented from the widespread male assumptions of slavery 'norms.' I also plan to add sections on slave identities and the differences between African-born and Brazilian-born slaves navigating the complex racial structure of Brazil in the 19th century.

At some point I would also like to add a section highlighting the issues of ex-slaves and manumission, which also has aspects that are uniquely Brazilian. Race relations largely influenced many aspects of manumission, cultivating racial divides that have remnants visible to this day. I think a deeper exploration of the effects of the diversity that existed in Brazil in this way would improve the breadth of this page, especially because race in colonial Brazil was a much more intricate social issue than many other places in the Americas.

Resistance to the institution of slavery was also distinct in Brazil. The page already has a small section on quilombos, and I think the page would benefit from additional information on this phenomenon as well as mention of traditional resistance methods that were less common in Brazil. I plan to add a section on one of the largest revolt-type movements in Brazil, the Muslim Uprising of 1835 in Salvador.

I would appreciate any feedback on my plans as well as on the edits when I make them. Lggernon (talk) 05:57, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree that there could be a lot more interesting information on slave resistance in Brazil. I added a small sentence but hopefully someone will be able to develop it further. Behemothing (talk) 22:20, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

I also agree that more information was needed to be added in the section of slave resistance in Brazil to make it more updated as there are a lot of content about them. Therefore, I have added into the section, on the content and terms that the slaves proposed to their master in the peace proposal. It is an interesting topic and I hope my additional information helps. Riesmaa (talk) 01:21, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

Suggestions

Lggernon requested a review, so here are a couple of suggestions for improving the article.

• I think the lead should be longer. Leads summarize the article and give the high points; see WP:LEAD for more details, but I'd say an article of this length should have at least a three paragraph lead.
• The Origins section has good material in it, but I think it needs to be resequenced. Right now it jumps from 1532 to the 1690s to the 1700s, then back to 1550, then back to the 15th century, then 1550, 1761, 1888, and back to the 18th century again. What you can put in here depends on what sources you have, but if you have the data, I think it would be good to have a sequence something like this:
  • 15th century Portuguese slave trade in Africa -- this is good background and sets the stage for the actions of the Portuguese
  • 1532 settlement -- currently you say that slavery started at this settlement, but you give no details -- it would be nice to give whatever specifics you can.
  • 1550 - the point at which the Portuguese start to bring in African slaves. Is there any data on the extent of the indigenous slave economy by that date? I.e. were there a large number of indigenous slaves, or were there only a few?
• The overall article organization feels a bit back-and-forth to me. There's some historical information, then the article talks about identity and gender, then it goes back to the history again. How about bringing all the historical material together, and moving the cultural discussions to subsequent sections by which time the reader has the historical background as context? Similarly, you have a section on "Resistance", but I think it would be better to integrate the material there into the historical narrative.
• Do sources discuss any interactions between the slave trade to Brazil and the slave trade elsewhere? For example, I wondered if the Portuguese raids in Africa were in different areas to the raids by other nations, which might have led to the slaves in Brazil being from different parts of Africa than the slaves traded to Spanish or English speaking countries. You hint at this in the section on African-born slaves, with the list of names, but it would be good to state this explicitly if it's in the sources. And did non-Portuguese slave traders sell slaves in Brazil?
• Are there any numbers, even if they are just estimates, for the volume of the trade? It would be great if there was some estimate of the number of slaves traded per year, or population estimates at various dates.
• Are more details available on the Bandeiras? The paragraph you have is good, but it just hints at what sounds like a major element of the story of slavery in Brazil.
• There are a few sentences without citations; if you can provide citations for those that would be great.

I'll be glad to go through and do a copyedit, but I'm going to hold off for now in case you take me up on the suggestions for reorganization -- copyediting is best done after any major changes. I hope this is helpful -- let me know if you have any questions; I'll be watching this page. -- Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:06, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

Thank you so much for your feedback!

I'm glad you pointed out the lead of the article, because I honestly had only glanced at it. I agree that it could use some lengthening and cleaning up to make it more comprehensive.

I also appreciate your ideas on the organization of both the Origins section and the article as a whole as well. I was feeling that the organization was not ideal, and it makes a lot of sense to keep the historical narrative together before the sections on identity.

As far as a skeleton reorganization, do you feel this flows better?

• 1. Origins
• 2. History
• 2.1 The Bandiera
• 2.2 Resistance
• 2.3 19th century and the rise of abolition
• 3. Slave identities
• 4. Gender divides
• 5. Modern era and quasi-slavery

I want to take your advice on reorganizing the Origins section, for I hadn't edited that section yet and I do think it could be improved with a more chronological flow of narrative. I might put your time periods as subsections depending on if it breaks up nicely.

In the History section I would like to include your suggestions on the specifics of the Portuguese slave trade in Africa, for which I found a source that lists four distinct periods of slave trade with Africa that correspond to the differing regions from which the Portuguese took their slaves from over time. As far as your question on non-Portuguese trade in Brazil, I know there was significant Dutch influence in the South but I will have to look into more sources on that. That would be a good addition! I want this to be part of a narrative on the general history that will be in the History section, but before the three subsections I listed. Does that seem like a logical organization? I am aiming for a general narrative, with the subsections there more for delving into the specifics. I could instead integrate those subsections into one big narrative and then divide it by time period as well. Perhaps after I make some changes you could let me know which one of those seems like the better option.

I have also come across a lot of statistics on the slave trade in Brazil that I agree would be a good addition to picture the scope of its presence in the country. I will put some of those in!

Lastly, as far as the Bandiera section goes, that section is not mine and I have not come across a lot of information about it in sources, but I agree it could use some more details. I will be on the lookout to provide those.

Thanks so much again for your help, and I will keep your last point in mind and put a citation on my sentences without one. What do you suggest about the issue of citation for edits that aren't mine? Should these sentences be deleted if I can't find the information in another source?

Lggernon (talk) 17:23, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

I like your suggested organization; I think that works well. I often find that I don't really know what the organization of an article should be until I've added quite a bit of material -- what you find in the sources can change how you think the article should be structured. Don't hesitate to change the structure again if you find more information that seems to you to justify a change.

For the Bandeira section, and the sentences that aren't yours and are uncited, it's really up to you. Of course it would be great if you improved those sections too, but I understand you're constrained by what you can do a good job on by the deadline. If you were going to submit this article to the "Good Article" review process, then you'd have to deal with everything in the article, not just the bits you wrote, but since you're not, I'd suggest you just fix them if you feel like it.

Ask again if you have more questions -- I am watching this talk page and will reply here, but you're welcome to ping me by email too if you like. I am traveling between Thursday afternoon and Saturday afternoon so I may not have a lot of time to post here, but if I get spare time at the hotels I will take a look. Unless my family insists on talking to me; sometimes they expect me to interact with them. :o)

-- Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 23:36, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Peer Edit Suggestions

As I was reading through the page, I really enjoyed what you did to the page, it really showed a lot of improvement in the overall flow of the page. There were some things that I noticed could be changed.

-First, I also felt like the page was pretty much back and forth between history and everything else. It would be good to change up the order of the page. -I noticed that in the section where you talk about slave identities, there are not a lot of sources, which I can understand since it is more historical, but I think it would be cool to try to find more sources to back up what you're saying. -The women section is overall pretty small. I feel like you touch on some things but then drop them off, such as the idea of prositution being a form of slavery for these slave women. Also, it just feels like you can expand on a lot. -On the Quilombo page, even though there's a separate page, maybe you can expand a bit on it.

Overall, the article is looking good. I think if you just work on these little things over time, your article could be really great.

03:24, 7 April 2013 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Natashacruz12 (talk • contribs)

I appreciate your feedback! As a responded to the comment above, I do feel like the organization of the page right now is jumping all over the place. I'm planning on congregating all the historical narrative together in the beginning and then going into the identity and gender sections. I listed my idea for the new organization on the previous comment, so you can see what you think!

It is a good point that the Women section is small, and I do plan on expanding it with the help of some new sources I have. I also plan to add a section on men below it to better show the differences between gender. The Quilombo section is one that I haven't worked on, but it is painfully brief for how large quilombos were in Brazilian slave resistance. I plan on adding at least a little bit depending on how much time I have.

As far a sources go, I have a few new ones that will hopefully give me some information to add to the identity sections so they are not all from the same source!

Thanks again for looking over the page, it's so helpful to get multiple opinions on it!

Lggernon (talk) 17:31, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Second review

Some more comments; I'll add more this evening as I have time.

• I like the lead; it's a big improvement.
• The origins section is a huge plus. The decision to start the story with Portuguese slavery prior to Columbus seems spot on to me; that really gives the reader a sense of the context of the article -- this wasn't something that started only with Brazil's colonization; it's part of a much bigger sequence of historical events.
• Can you explain or link "Paulistano"? A quick Google leads me to think it refers to residents of Sao Paolo, but that seems odd in context.
• The history of the bandeiras seems contradictory -- they are composed at least partly of Jesuits, but then it appears that a notorious bandeirante destroyed many Jesuit missions. Can you clarify that part?
• The history section mentions that the slave trade had been "technically illegal since 1826"; this seems like a major piece of information, but you don't give any details here or elsewhere. What was this? A law passed banning the import of slaves, so that the institution remained but new slaves could not be brought into the country? The same goes for the British "forcibly halting" the trade -- sounds like we need more information on that.
• You mention "internal slave trade"; presumably this means the trading of existing slaves between owners. What do you mean by "the country became dependent on an internal slave trade"? I would think the country continued to be dependent on the existing pool of slave labour, but I don't see how it would be dependent on the internal trade.
• " cattle ranching and foodstuff production expanded to the decline of the mining industries": I'm not really sure what you mean by this. Do you mean "while the mining industry declined", or did the growth of ranching and agriculture actually draw away labour resources from mining, contributing to its decline?
• "on November 7, 1831 ... a law banning the slave trade in Brazil was passed": again I think we need a bit more detail. Did this ban the sale of slaves internally or did it ban the import of slaves? In which case what was the 1826 law?
• "Skin color was a significant factor in determining the status of African descendants born in Brazil": I assume a lighter skin meant better chances of manumission, but either way it should be made explicit.
• "The invisibility of women in Brazilian slavery as well as in slavery in general has only been recently recognized as a pervasive historical rift": I'm not sure this means what you want it to. I assume you mean that historical accounts of Brazilian slavery have until recently focused on the experiences of male slaves? If so, I think this needs rephrasing; "historical rift" isn't very specific.
• The "Women" subsection consists entirely of a single sentence quote. I don't think this is a good way of presenting the information; I think this should be paraphrased. Also, any reason not to delete that heading, and just combine that information with the sentences above?
• "the work of Brazilian women in urban centers often countered the traditional divisions of slave and free": not sure what this means.
• "Among Brazilian-born adult ex-slaves in Salvador, 60% were women": is this a statistic for a particular date, or was it generally true over a long period?
• The long list of dates of slave revolts really cries out for more details. Even a table would be nice -- date, location of revolt, and a brief description including e.g. how many slaves revolted, how long the revolt lasted and how it was put down.
• "a total of two mulattos and three Brazilian-born blacks were arrested during the 1835 revolt": the intended implication is clear, but if you know how many non-Brazilian-born slaves were arrested it would make the point more directly.
• "the uprising was efficiently quelled by creole and mulatto troops": this is the first time the article mentions creoles, and there's no definition given; since the slave identities were complex I think this really needs to be defined before it's used.
• The section on Quilombos seems to have a random sentence attached to the end; it should probably be moved or deleted.

-- Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:23, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Suggest moving the Resistance section into the History section for better chronology. ---Asteuartw (talk) 11:40, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks so much for your feedback! I tried to address all of your points, and if I couldn't find more information on it I either got rid of it or changed it a little bit. I like your idea of a chart for all the revolts a lot, but unfortunately the source I got it from doesn't give information on all of them and I'm not going to have time before the deadline to track them all down. I changed it from a list format however, which I think makes it easier to read. I also moved the Resistance section into the History section, I think it does fit a little better there.

Lggernon (talk) 16:03, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Nice. Much improved. Suggest starting with History as the first main heading, then adding origins as a sub-heading beneath. ----Asteuartw (talk) 09:28, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

New Contributions 10/2/14

Hi, I am student from Rice University in Houston, TX, and am planning on contributing to this article. From previous comments I can see there are already a lot of agreement, especially with Quilombos, about room for expansion. I’ve been exposed to course material and personal experiences that have lead me to have a passion about Brazil. Understanding Brazil, therefore, means that at some point you must talk about and understand the institution of slavery in Brazil. Another aspect that I planned on contributing to is the section pertaining to gender. I’ve encountered great material to be further cited, and also plan to talk about children in the same manner. One key point I want to address is the difference between those who owned slaves in lets say in the United States, compared to Brazil. Those in the United States did not have the resources to purchase slaves continuously; instead they purchased families and effectively bred millions into slavery. In Brazil, however, proximity to Africa allowed for even cheaper slave labor that had a different dynamic than the United States: slaves were commodities not even worth investing in.

An entirety of the article thus far is great, I like the structure and the flow of the content. Comparing the English article to the Portuguese article, which was most likely written by Brazilians, there are still discrepancies. One such is the information regarding slavery between indigenous groups. I will contribute what is missing and try and have a continuity of voice between articles that promote Brazilian perspective. Another contribution that I wanted to make looked more to the future or race relations within Brazil. While I understand there should be another article about contemporary race relations, I think it would do to mention at least something that could tie past and present. One such example of race relations is about Olodum, a Bahian drum core located in the city of Salvador, that plays annually for Carnaval. Together with other organization they have recently created a ‘black only’ bloco (Carnaval festivity) which essentially prohibits white skinned Brazilians from participating in their festivities. Their creed isn’t necessarily racist in its roots, rather they are advocating for black empowerment and represent ideals similar to Malcolm X and MLK. The growing disparity between whites and blacks also continue to demonstrate Brazil’s separate social stigma.

Proposed structural changes:

3.3 Children 

3.3.1 Work and treatment among the working slaves 4. Modern era and quasi-slavery 5. Contemporary race relations 5.1 Olodum 5.2 Musical commentaries on the progress of race tensions

I loved the article and have seen many facets in which to expand. Let me know what you all are thinking, I can tell that this article is cared for and I want to help add good information. Benito103910 (talk) 22:33, 2 October 2014 (UTC)

Advice for Bentio103910

I think you have done a great job with your contributions to this article. You have a great writing style and found the perfect balance between providing specific details and general summaries of information. A quick formatting issue I think you should address is the placement of the photos between the "Carnaval" and "Legacy" section since it is not clear which section you want to the photos to be in even though I think they are suppose to be apart of "Carnaval". I would now work on expanding the "Legacy" section to illustrate the impact of slavery on present day Brazil. This could be its own article, but I think a paragraph or two would suffice for this portion of the article. Keep up the great work!

MBouchein (talk) 06:07, 6 November 2014 (UTC)MBouchein

To add to what MBouchein said, I think that formatting and comprehensiveness would greatly improve the quality of this article. The section on resistance is not in chronological order. Additionally legacy and modern era could be combined into one section since they are so closely related. As far as comprehensiveness, I feel that some sections of the history of slavery are missing from the article. For example, slavery in Brazil now takes the form of bonded slavery where individuals work as a means to repay a loan. However, this may be difficult to find adequate sourcing for since it is more recent. Nnlpz (talk) 06:41, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Questions

I really like this article -- it answered all of the questions I had and much, much more, but I have a question/comment:

It says "The fact that slavery was not synonymous with a particular skin color, as was the case in the United States at the same time...."

While in the US all slaves were black, but not all blacks were slaves, so slavery was clearly non synonymous with skin color. There were black slaves, free blacks, freedman and even black slave owners in the USA. 155.213.224.59 (talk) 17:41, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

Add to "The end of slavery"

"The end of slavery" section should be added to, with details about how slavery was gradually ended, via free womb emancipation, the Sexagenarian Law, and compensation for slaveowners.

A good source for this information is Drescher's The Abolition of Slavery and the Aftermath of Emancipation in Brazil: https://www.worldcat.org/title/abolition-of-slavery-and-the-aftermath-of-emancipation-in-brazil/oclc/191222368

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Link Preview Text

I'm not sure how to change this, but could a more experienced editor change the text that appears under the link preview for this page? Right now it is an image of a slave being beaten with a caption saying "WISH WE COULD TURN BACK TIME, TO THE GOOD OLD DAYS." This is obviously inappropriate, but I don't know how to change this and can't find anything to show me how. Hopefully someone else is able to do so quickly. Thanks! Mrc23 (talk) 09:15, 26 December 2023 (UTC)

@Mrc23: Hi, due to the way previews are displayed, you will need to purge the page once the vandalism is reversed. That will force the newest revision to appear as the preview. There should be a gadget in your preferences to make this easier. See WP:PURGE for more info. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 21:16, 2 January 2024 (UTC)