Immigration and Acculturation in Brazil and Argentina

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1 Immigration and Acculturation in Brazil and Argentina

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3 Immigration and Acculturation in Brazil and Argentina May E. Bletz

4 immigration and acculturation in brazil and argentina Copyright May E. Bletz, Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition All rights reserved. First published in 2010 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN in the United States a division of St. Martin s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number , of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave and Macmillan are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN DOI / ISBN (ebook) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Bletz, May E. Immigration and acculturation in Brazil and Argentina : / May E. Bletz. p. cm. 1. Brazil Emigration and immigration. 2. Argentina Emigration and immigration. 3. Acculturation Brazil. 4. Acculturation Argentina. 5. Brazil Foreign relations. 6. Argentina Foreign relations. I. Title. JV4672.A2B ' dc Design by Scribe Inc. First edition: October

5 Contents Foreword vii Introduction 1 1 In Sickness and in Health 17 2 Purifying the Urban Landscape: Processes of Immigration, Acculturation, and Resistance in Buenos Aires 53 3 Negotiating New Identities: Argentina of the Centennial 83 4 Brazil and Its Discontents: Romero and Torres 115 Conclusion: Whiteness of a Darker Color 145 Notes 149 Bibliography 167 Index 177

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7 Foreword The idea of this monograph probably started on a trip to São Paulo almost ten years ago. On a rainy afternoon I decided to visit the Museu da Imigração, which used to be the Hospedaria de Imigrantes (Immigrant s Hostel) built between 1886 and 1888, in the Brás district. This hospedaria targeted to accommodate and forward to the plantations the immigrants who arrived here under the responsibility of the provincial government of São Paulo. Nobody had ever heard of the place. I went there once by subway but had to leave, afraid of the neighborhood. The next day, I took a taxi, and, armed with a detailed but as it turned out inaccurate map, about two hours later the friendly driver and I made it. Living in New York City at the time, I was fascinated by the contrast between this neglected Immigrant s Hostel and Ellis Island. That São Paulo had been an immigrant city was very obvious, with its Middle Eastern, Italian, and Japanese restaurants. Apparently, Brazilians treated their ethnicity differently, I decided, and I wondered how and why. Recently, I Googled the museum and checked their Web site, which did not exist when I was there. A professional site, with a part in English, praises the museum s importance. The site claims the museum retains ship boarding lists, recording logs of sponsored immigrants, calling letters (to bring parents and relatives to Brazil), legal proceedings of colony units, as well as personal documents and diaries donated by some immigrants plus eight thousand photographic images, among negatives and originals. Furthermore, the site states, several immigrants and their offspring, organized in clubs and communities, have elected the building of the memorial as a reference and meeting place, strengthening the ties between the past events and the present-day use. The Sector of Oral History of the Memorial do Imigrante is a collective testimony by immigrants

8 viii foreword from more than sixty nationalities, who arrived here in search of a better life. The point is not so much whether the memorial in São Paulo will succeed in becoming a tourist attraction similar to Ellis Island, but rather, how cultural practices of identity formation continually shift. After years of neglect, the memorial has been rediscovered by Paulistas who want to officialize their immigrant origin. But nowhere was it mentioned that though that particular neighborhood, Bráz, started out largely Italian, today it is mostly populated, according to the taxi driver, by newer immigrants, nordestinos, people from Northeast Brazil. This continual recreation of traditions is the point of departure for this work. Libraries have been written on immigration from a sociological and historical perspective, rarely from a cultural studies perspective. I discovered I had to come up with different keywords and knit together a corpus. Among the most helpful books I used were the works of Beatriz Sarlo on Argentine modernity and Hugo Vezetti s work on Argentine psychiatry, in which he explains the relation between immigration; the outsider; and the fear of contamination. Both works include discussions on people such as Ricardo Rojas and Ramos Mejía. On the Brazilian side, I was asked to review Jeffrey Lesser s Negotiating National Identities, which helped me tremendously in envisioning this project. Lesser taught me to see how cultural practices, including racist discourses and actions, are neither reducible to nor intelligible in terms of class exploitation alone. In short, these whitening practices had a reality of their own and cannot simply be reduced to an economic base. Obviously, there are gaps in this study that need to be filled by future scholars. A wise outside reader for Palgrave recommended I abstain from discussing Sarmiento s works in great detail. Sadly, I had to cut out the part on the wonderful Roberto Arlt, whose enigmatic prose deserves much more space than I would have been able to give him in this work. I chose certain representative intellectuals, based partly on availability, relevance, and my own taste, but I am fully aware that many others could be mentioned as well. I have many people to thank for their help with this project. Jane Koustas and The Humanities Research Fund at Brock University

9 foreword ix enabled me to do research in both Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo in the summer of Originally, this work started as a PhD dissertation I wrote at the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at New York University. I am deeply grateful for the valuable comments and suggestions by George Yudice of the University of Miami, Mary Louise Pratt, Gerard Aching, Marta Peixoto, and Ana Dopico of New York University. A very big thank you to Sônia Roncador of the University of Texas at Austin for all her enthusiasm and for introducing me to the works of Júlia Lopes de Almeida; to Jason Borge of Vanderbilt University for showing me how to present my project to publishers; and to Joseph Pierce, who did a wonderful job editing the manuscript. I also thank my editors at Palgrave Macmillan Julia Cohen and Samantha Hasey for their enthusiasm and professionalism. And to all my friends and family who have supported me over the years you know who you are thank you.