A country warmly hospitable and surprisingly violent, physically beautiful, yet appallingly poor—these are the contrasts Joseph Page explores in The Brazilians, a monumental book on one of the most colorful and paradoxical places on earth. Once one of the strongest market economies in the world, Brazil now struggles to emerge from a deep economic and social crisis, the latest and deepest nose-dive in a giddy roller-coaster ride that Brazilians have experienced over the past three decades. Page examines Brazil in the context of this current crisis and the events leading up to it. In so doing, he reveals the unique character of the Brazilian people and how this national character has brought the country to where it is today—teetering on the verge of joining the First World, or plunging into unprecedented environmental calamity and social upheaval. Not since Luigi Barzini's The Italians has a society been so deeply and accurately portrayed.
Author(s): Joseph A. Page
Publisher: Addison-Wesley
Year: 1995
Language: English
Pages: 540
Tags: brazil,latin,south,america,culture,portuguese
Part One Who Are the Brazilians?
Chapter 1 The Portuguese 35
Chapter 2 The Africans 57
Chapter 3 The Indians 85
Chapter 4 The Immigrants 100
Part Two The Pyramid of Power in Brazil
Chapter 5 The Haves 121
Chapter 6 Controlling Brazilian Minds 154
Chapter 7 The Have-Nots 177
Chapter 8 Lula and the Workers' Party 201
Part Three The Curse of Violence in Brazil
Chapter 9 The Culture of Brutality 229
Chapter 10 Suffer the Little Children 259
Chapter 11 Abusing Nature's Bounty 276
Chapter 12 The Amazon Basin 291
Part Four Spiritual Brazil
Chapter 13 Roman Catholicism 321
Chapter 14 The Orixas 351
Chapter 15 Evangelicals on the Move 371
Part Five In Search of What Makes Brazilians Brazilian
Chapter 16 Soccer Madness 387
Chapter 17 The Lesser Gods 412
Chapter 18 The Telenovela 444
Chapter 19 In the Land of Carnival 466
Chapter 20 Whither Brazil? 486
Selected Bibliography 499
Index 525
