Race on the Move

Brazilian Migrants and the Global Reconstruction of Race

Tiffany D. Joseph

• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9780804794398
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Emigration & Immigration
• Index: Social Sciences

Race on the Move takes readers on a journey from Brazil to the United States and back again to consider how migration between the two countries is changing Brazilians' understanding of race relations. Brazil once earned a global reputation as a racial paradise, and the United States is infamous for its overt social exclusion of nonwhites. Yet, given the growing Latino and multiracial populations in the United States, the use of quotas to address racial inequality in Brazil, and the flows of people between each country, contemporary race relations in each place are starting to resemble each other.

Tiffany Joseph interviewed residents of Governador Valadares, Brazil's largest immigrant-sending city to the U.S., to ask how their immigrant experiences have transformed local racial understandings. Joseph identifies and examines a phenomenon—the transnational racial optic—through which migrants develop and ascribe social meaning to race in one country, incorporating conceptions of race from another. Analyzing the bi-directional exchange of racial ideals through the experiences of migrants, Race on the Move offers an innovative framework for understanding how race can be remade in immigrant-sending communities.

CHAPTER 1

THE BRAZILIAN TOWN THAT UNCLE SAM BUILT

It [migration] has been very good for Valadares [GV]. Excellent for two things: the economy and the development of the city, house construction. Many people who before [migrating] were poor and did not live comfortably. Today they have nice homes. They have comfort, they can educate their children. There are many parents who work there [in the U.S.] and leave their children behind. The person who goes there and returns comes back more sociable, with much better manners, [they’re] much calmer than the Brazilians who stay here and more socially conscious [in recognizing] that what is public is for everyone. This they [migrants] learned there [in the U.S.]. So I think it improved the economy and social relations a lot.

Lorena, age 40, returnee

Lorena’s thoughts about the influence of U.S. migration on GV are pervasive in the city. Though Lorena’s perspective is mostly positive, I could also sense the tension in her voice when she mentioned that some parents leave their children behind, implying that migration had negative effects as well. Over the course of my time in GV, I heard a range of comments about the benefits and disadvantages of migration ties between GV and the United States that indicated just how intricately connected the two places are.¹ I still remember walking around downtown GV on a Sunday evening after first settling in and being surprised by the lack of activity on the streets. Typically, everything shuts down on Sundays for the Sabbath, and most evangelical Brazilians go to worship services in the evening. In search of a place to have dinner, I wandered into a small pizzeria—the one place that was open. I was the only customer and greeted the staff of three inside: the server—a short woman with light-brown skin similar to my own and shoulder-length loosely curled black hair; another server—a woman of average height with fairer skin, dark-brown eyes, and long, straight light-brown hair; and the cook—a tall fair-skinned man with hazel eyes and short, slightly curly light-brown hair. After taking my order, the second woman, Carla, engaged me in conversation.² Noticing my foreign-accented Portuguese, she asked where I was from. When I replied that I was American, Carla told me that her boss, the pizzeria owner, had lived in the United States for ten years where he worked in an Italian restaurant. When she told the cook—who was also her boyfriend and the owner’s nephew—that I was American, he came over to speak with me while my pizza cooked. Ernesto, the cook, told me his uncle had returned to GV many years earlier; with the cooking skills he acquired working in the United States, he opened three pizzerias—the one we were currently in and two others in another part of the city. Each had been relatively successful, and Ernesto showed me framed pictures, newspaper clippings, and plaques on the wall honoring his uncle for his civic contributions. Carla also told me that she had relatives living in New York City and someday hoped to emigrate with Ernesto, if not there, then to Europe. I told them about my research and thanked them for sharing their insights with me. Over the course of my time in GV, I occasionally stopped in to the pizzeria to have a meal and chat with them.³ It was through informal conversations like these that I began to understand the all-encompassing impact of U.S. migration in the city, which was not obvious at first glance.

Before arriving, I had heard stories about GV through my own transnational network of Brazilian and U.S. scholars. I had heard it was possible to exchange U.S. dollars on the street, that local stores and restaurants had American-English names, and that English was spoken widely in everyday conversation. I expected to see various aspects of “America” around me in GV. What I encountered was a beautiful small city with a distinctly rural aesthetic that was very different from the scenic tropical and beach-filled images of Rio de Janeiro that foreigners typically associate with Brazil. Aside from seeing a few shops with English-language names, I did not hear much English or see any U.S. dollars being exchanged in the streets. Since GV is not a major U.S. tourist destination, I encountered few Americans, and I realized I would have to rely on my Portuguese to better understand how GV became the town that “Tio [Uncle] Sam Built.”⁴ As I made GV my temporary home, I wondered how this city had become Brazil’s largest emigrant-sending city to the United States. I also wanted to learn how the U.S. presence began in GV, how transnational ties had been maintained in both places, and how GV racial demographics differed from those in other parts of Brazil. In this chapter, I examine these themes to shed light on the social context that shaped Valadarenses’ racial conceptions before migrating and influenced their development of the transnational racial optic throughout the migration experience.

FROM GOVERNADOR VALADARES TO VALA-DOLARES

Originally incorporated in 1937, GV is a young city with 260,000 residents, and it is located in the southeastern part of Minas Gerais in south central Brazil. Minas Gerais is completely landlocked and one of the largest states in Brazil (see map). Called Minas for short, it is Brazil’s leading producer of coffee, milk, beef, and cachaça, which is the Brazilian rum used to make the national drink, caipirinha. Because of its rugged landscape, cattle farming is important for the state and national economy. The nearby Rio Doce (Sweet River) has reserves of amethyst, topaz, quartz, and mica, which attracted American mining companies in the 1940s. The city is also home to Ibituruna Peak, which has an elevation of 3,700 feet and attracts international visitors every year for its world championship paragliding competition.

Although GV is a city, it has a relaxed ambiance, perhaps due to its somewhat isolated location in the state.⁵ The closest major Brazilian cities are the state capital of Belo Horizonte (193 miles to the west) and Rio de Janeiro (360 miles to the south). However, GV is the closest urban center to the smaller 22 Brazilian towns surrounding it.⁶ Due to the slower pace of life in GV, I found Valadarenses to be friendlier and more personable than Brazilians I met in more populous parts of the country. This pace of life is also reflected in the Sertaneja music that is popular in GV, as well as in the traditional home-cooked food of Minas Gerais, called comida caseira, which is delicious but heavy.⁷ Similar to the southern United States, the climate in GV is hot and humid, with temperatures exceeding 100 degrees Fahrenheit in the summer and 80 degrees in the winter, which made me wonder why most Valadarenses migrate to the frigid northeastern United States.

Map. Brazil with Governador Valadares inset.

Before I arrived, I repeatedly heard two things from non-GV Brazilians: (1) “Governador Valadares is so hot” and (2) “nearly the entire city is in the United States.” Because so many Valadarenses have migrated to the United States, the city has become heavily dependent on financial remittances sent from migrants in the United States and elsewhere to sustain its economy; an estimated U.S.$2.4 billion was sent in 2004.⁸ Money sent by Valadarenses abroad drives the local economy and is used to support family members, construct homes and other buildings, start businesses, and facilitate post-migration financial security and social mobility.⁹ Formally recognizing its importance, the city government erected a plaque in a prominent plaza that pays homage to the sons and daughters of GV who have migrated and worked abroad, usually performing unskilled and low-wage labor in industrialized countries. While walking through this plaza on my way home one day, I stopped to read the plaque’s inscription: “A tribute to the emigrants who do justice to dignified labor, they are heroes for their contribution to the development of Governador Valadares.”¹⁰ What stood out to me symbolically was that it was dedicated on July 4, 2006. July 4 is, of course, Independence Day in the United States, and in GV it is the annual “Day of the Emigrant,” celebrated with a festival in the main city plaza, illustrating the significant tie that bonds GV and the United States.

The economic development spurred by GV-to-United States migration has increased land and property values in the region, leading to real estate and commercial development in the outskirts of the city. Nicolas, a 52-year-old non-migrant, agreed:

Valadares is a city that for many years has generated lots of money, since many of its people are in the U.S. and they send money, especially [for] civil construction. There is much development in this regard including real estate and land, [and] farms . . . have become really expensive because of this. Now that the dollar is lower, people are investing less here [in real estate], but civil construction in Valadares has not fallen as much because Brazil is picking up and there is internal investment. If the dollar gets higher again, then immigrants will send more money and civil construction will be better here than in the rest of the country.

However, one unintended consequence of economic remittances has been a rise in the cost of living for all Valadarenses; the local economy’s dependence on the U.S. dollar has inflated prices for basic goods, cars, and homes.¹¹ Nicolas and other Valadarenses I interviewed made a direct link between GV’s economic stability and the value of the U.S. dollar. Consequently, the local GV economy has an inverse relationship to Brazil’s national economy: when the Brazilian currency is as strong as the U.S. dollar, GV’s economy suffers. The socioeconomic context in which most Valadarenses learn about their city, its position within Brazil, and the larger world are heavily shaped by GV’s migration ties to the United States.

Photo 1. House in GV built with U.S. remittances. Source: Author

THE ARRIVAL OF THE AMERICANOS

The history of the U.S. presence in GV dates back to the 1940s, when U.S. mining executives arrived to extract mica, a mineral in high demand during World War II for making radios.¹² At that time, the U.S. government also established an anti-malarial public health campaign in GV and the surrounding area.¹³ The presence of white Americans and U.S.-funded public health projects were Valadarenses’ first and primary exposure to the United States. Many were impressed by the high value of the U.S. dollar, which some Valadarenses received as payment for employment or services from the Americans. The modern appliances and cars that the Americans brought with them also represented the good life in America, which left an indelible mark on many Valadarenses. According to sociologist Sueli Siqueira, “[the U.S. dollar] which had a value much higher than Brazilian money, gave them [Valadarenses] an idea of the opulence and abundance of the place that the Americans came from . . . it gave them the vision of the USA as El Dorado.”¹⁴

Valadarenses’ encounters with Americans during the peak of the mining industry had already begun to shape their perceptions of the United States as a land of opportunity. But the lucrative mining industry that brought Americans to GV declined in the 1960s, and nearly all of these visitors eventually returned to the United States. One American family, the Simpsons, remained in GV. They established an English school and started a cultural exchange program that brought a small number of middle- and upper-class Valadarenses to the United States in the 1960s.¹⁵ This initial group of temporary migrants established the social networks that would be influential in the large migration stream from GV that occurred in the 1980s at the onset of a huge Brazilian economic crisis.¹⁶

Although they left Brazil to pursue new opportunities, many Valadarenses planned to return before they had even left Brazil. Their desire to return home was strong motivation for migrants to remain socially and financially connected to GV during migration. Migrants from GV hoped to work for a few years and save enough money to return and buy a home or a car, or to start a business. This process has been referred to in the scholarship on Brazilian return migration as “fazer a América,” which translates to “making America.”¹⁷ The goal of many Valadarenses has been to “make America” in Brazil after their U.S. migration. Of the returnees I interviewed, 39 of 49 went to the United States with the intent to return.

Photo 2. Former home of the Simpsons, the American family that stayed in GV and created the first U.S. cultural exchanges. This is now a museum. Source: Author

The goal of “making America” was what brought 34-year-old returnee Felipe to Massachusetts in 1999. Unable to get a tourist visa, Felipe traveled from Brazil to Mexico, where he crossed the border illegally:¹⁸

In Brazil ten years ago, Brazil was very difficult. I had a lot of trouble finding a job and I wanted something better for my family. I wanted to go there for a while, to earn money so I could return . . . I always had the desire to go to the U.S. So, [I went for] two reasons, necessity and also curiosity and desire to be in a different country.

Because Felipe initially left behind his wife and daughter, he sent back money to support them and eventually financed their trip to the United States a few years later. Although Felipe lived in fear of being deported, he felt he accomplished his financial goals. Before migrating, Felipe had worked in construction and at a hardware store, earning about $1,100 a month. When I interviewed him in 2007, Felipe told me his monthly income of about $8,700 (USD) came from owning a store and some rental properties that he acquired with money earned in the United States, where he worked at Dunkin’ Donuts and as a carpenter.¹⁹

Photo 3. Skyline of GV with condominium a...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Copyright
• Title Page
• Series Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Map, Figures, Tables, and Photos
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: Migration and Racial Movement across Borders
• 1. The Brazilian Town That Uncle Sam Built
• 2. Deciphering U.S. Racial Categories
• 3. Navigating the U.S. Racial Divide
• 4. Racial Classification after the Return Home
• 5. Racially Making America in Brazil
• 6. Social Consequences of the Transnational Racial Optic
• Conclusion: Toward Global Racial (Re)Formations
• Appendix
• Notes
• References
• Index
• Series List