Brazil

III

People and Society

Brazil’s population is a mixture of Native American, European, and African peoples. These groups have intermingled over the years to create a society with considerable ethnic complexity. The Native American population has been in Brazil the longest, but is now the smallest group. The Portuguese began arriving in 1500, and other European groups came after 1850. The ancestors of African Brazilians arrived as slaves, beginning about the mid-1500s and ending in 1850 when the slave trade was abolished.

Brazil’s population growth was generally high during the 20th century, but it began to slow in the 1980s. Until recently the population was predominantly rural and agricultural. The last half of the 20th century brought rapid urbanization due to population growth and the migration of people from rural areas seeking employment in the expanding industries of the cities.

A

Population

Brazil was first settled by Native American peoples, many of them members of the Tupí-Guaraní cultures. It is difficult to estimate the size of the Native American population at the time the Europeans arrived. There are no written records, and because of the scattered distribution of the tribes there is little substantive evidence remaining about their history. Recent calculations suggest that between 1 and 6 million Native Americans lived in Brazil prior to the arrival of the Portuguese in 1500. However, as a consequence of war, enslavement, and the introduction of European diseases, the indigenous population decreased rapidly. Estimates for 1819 suggest that the Native American population had fallen by two-thirds. In 2000 Native Americans made up less than 1 percent of the population, living in isolated groups in remote regions of the rain forest.

Portuguese settlement was slow and small-scale. When they arrived in 1500, they established settlements along the coast and exported agricultural products to Europe. By 1600 there were no more than 30,000 European settlers in the country. The population increased during the 18th century as a result of natural increase and immigration to Brazil’s gold fields, which were discovered in the late 17th century. Population also increased when the Portuguese brought slaves from Africa to Brazil to provide labor for the sugar plantations and gold mines. More than 2 million slaves arrived during the colonial period. By 1800 Brazil’s total population was estimated at around 3.25 million, of which about 1 million were Europeans, 2 million were free or enslaved Africans or of mixed race, and about 250,000 were Native Americans.

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During the early part of the 19th century more than 1 million more slaves were imported. After the slave trade was abolished in 1850, the country’s population continued to grow by natural increase and immigration. Immigrants from Italy, Portugal, Germany, and Spain started coming to Brazil after 1850. Brazil’s first census, in 1872, recorded a population of 9,930,478; by 1900 the population was just over 17 million. Immigration continued to be substantial until the 1930s, with many Japanese arriving after 1908. Since then, population growth has been primarily due to natural increase.

In 1950 Brazil had 51,944,000 inhabitants, and by 1980 the population had more than doubled, rising to 119,002,700. The most recent census, in 2000, recorded a population of 169,799,170. A 2007 estimate placed the population at 190,010,647. Contributory factors to these high growth rates were immigration, a high birth rate, and a death rate that has declined steadily since 1870.

In Brazil, there are considerable regional variations in population density. The most densely peopled states are Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo in the Southeast and the Federal District in the Center-West. The least populous states are Roraima and Amazonas, both in the North. About 80 percent of the population lives within 350 km (220 mi) of the coast. Until the mid-1960s there were more rural dwellers than people living in towns; since then the urban population has increased as industrialization lures workers to the larger cities. About 84 percent of the population is now classed as urban, and a significant proportion lives in big cities.

B

Principal Cities

The largest city in Brazil is São Paulo, the main industrial center of the nation. São Paulo is also the largest city in South America, with an estimated population in 2004 of 10.8 million. The former capital, Rio de Janeiro, ranks second. It is an important port and commercial center. Other important cities include Salvador, the regional capital of the Northeast; Belo Horizonte, a major industrial and commercial city in Minas Gerais; and Brasília, the capital of Brazil. Each of these cities forms the core of a larger urban area. In 2000 there were eight other cities in Brazil with more than 1 million inhabitants: Manaus, a port on the Río Negro near its confluence with the Amazon; Belém, a northern port on the mouth of the Amazon; Fortaleza and Recife, along the northeast coast; Curitiba and Porto Alegre in the south; Goiânia, in the south central; and Guarulhos, a suburb of São Paulo.

C

Ethnic Groups

Brazil’s population is derived from three main ethnic sources. The earliest secure date for the arrival of Native Americans in Brazil is about 10,000 years ago. Europeans arrived in 1500, and for the next three centuries European immigration was restricted to only the Portuguese. African slaves came from West Africa, the Congo, Angola, and Mozambique. Relations between these groups created a complex population pattern of mixed races, described by an often subtle terminology based on color—for example, preto (black), escuro (dark), mulato escuro (dark brown), or mulato claro (light brown).

Racial classifications in Brazil are not as sharply defined as in other nations. The Portuguese colonists who settled Brazil had a more relaxed attitude toward interracial relationships than other Europeans and often intermarried with Africans and Native Americans. In addition, racial classification often reflects an individual’s economic or social standing. For example, a Brazilian of mixed racial heritage who has done well economically may be classified as white.

The white population tends to be slightly more prevalent in urban areas while the black and mulatto population is slightly more populous in rural areas. There are also some strong regional variations. In the Northeast, where large numbers of slaves were imported during colonial times to work the sugar plantations, more than 70 percent of the people were recorded as black or mulatto in 1999. In the Southeast the population was classified as 64 percent white and 35 percent black or mulatto; in the South, which was settled mainly by European immigrants, more than 84 percent of the people were recorded as white. Brazil is widely regarded as a racially open society, with few ethnic tensions, and there is no recent history of legal discrimination. However, whites tend to occupy positions at the top of Brazil’s social structure, while blacks often occupy the lower economic levels of society. Considerable room for social mobility exists among individuals with a mixed racial heritage.

D

Languages

Portuguese is the official and prevailing language of Brazil, although there are some regional variations in pronunciation and slang words. Since 1938 Portuguese has been the compulsory language for teaching in schools, but German and Italian are still spoken in homes in the South by some descendants of immigrants. English and French are the main second languages of educated Brazilians.

There are also more than 100 indigenous languages, of which the most important are Tupí, Gê, Arawak, and Carib. The Portuguese borrowed some Indian words, particularly from Tupí, which was the common language used in interactions among the Native Americans of the coastal regions, Jesuit missionaries, and early settlers. Many settlements and physical features still have Indian place names. The settlers also borrowed some words from the vocabulary of African slaves.

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