Slavery and Freedom in Colonial Brazil

Combining modern scholarship with a wealth of documentary and archival evidence, this is an authoritative portrait of the lives of slaves and free persons of colour in colonial Brazil. The author charts the working conditions, domestic lives, preoccupations and aspirations of slaves and their fellow freed men. In a work which underlines the validity and importance of minority histories, he argues that the slaves and freedmen of colonial Brazil maintained and preserved their own cultural identity, taking decisions independently of the white ruling class. The result is not a history of extremes - black and white, slave and master - but instead an account of the ambiguities surrounding issues of race, freedom and the individual, which provides an insight not only in to the past and present of Brazil, but also into areas of racial and social identity. With an extensive preface outlining recent developments in the field, and a full and updated bibliography, this edition of aims to provide information for students and historians alike.

ISBN 1851682880   Pages 364 ISBN13 9781851682881 (What's this?)   Volumes 1 Publisher Oneworld Publications   Weight (grammes) 535 Imprint Oneworld Publications   Published in London Format Paperback   Height (mm) 229 Publication date 08 Feb 2002   Width (mm) 152 Library of Congress F   Spine width (mm) 19 DEWEY 305.896081   Academic level General DEWEY edition DC21

		List of plates
		Acknowledgements
		Preface
		Preface to the new edition: Free and freed persons of African descent in colonial Brazil: trends and historiography, 1982-2002
1		Africans and Europeans: historiography and perceptions of reality		1
2		Paths to freedom		27
3		Free blacks and free mulattos in the economy of Portuguese America		50
4		Free blacks and free mulattos in the society of Portuguese America		67
5		Voicing of aspirations by persons of African descent		83
6		The person of African descent in the culture of Portuguese America		95
7		The other slavery: gold mining and the 'peculiar institution'		104
8		Collective behaviour: the brotherhoods		128
9		Domestic behaviour: family and kinship		161
10		Chiaroscuro in colonial Brazil		198
		Notes		204
		Bibliography		253
		Index		285

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