History 157A Colonial Brazil
Winter, 1993
University of California, Santa Barbara
Office hours: Tuesdays 3-5 p.m. Francis A. Dutra and by appointment; there will be Ellison 5839
no office hours during finals week
ORIENTATION: Jan. 4
I. PORTUGUESE BACKGROUND AND EARLY PORTUGUESE OVERSEAS
EXPANSION. Jan. 4, 6.
II. THE BRAZILIAN AMERINDIAN AND THE PORTUGUESE RESPONSE.
Jan. 11, 13.
Holiday: Jan. 18 - Martin Luther King Jr.
III. THE SETTLEMENT OF BRAZIL AND ITS GOVERNANCE, 1500-1750.
Jan. 20, 25.
IV. THE SETTLEMENT OF BRAZIL AND ITS SOCIETY AND ECONOMY,
1500-1750. Jan. 25, 27.
V. THE AFRICAN HERITAGE OF COLONIAL BRAZIL. Feb. 1, 3.
MIDTERM EXAMINATION: Feb. 8, Monday, 7-8:30 p.m.
From the discussion questions in the first five topics,
at least five questions will be chosen for this exam (at
least one from each topic). The student will answer two
of these questions for 40% of the course grade.
Holiday: Feb. 15 - President's Day
VI. THE ROLE OF THE FRONTIER IN COLONIAL BRAZIL. Feb. 10, 17.
VII. GOLD AND THE BRAZILIAN ECONOMY. Feb. 17, 22.
VIII. SOCIETY IN COLONIAL BRAZIL. Feb. 22, 24.
IX. CHARITY, RELIGION AND CULTURE IN COLONIAL BRAZIL.
March 1, 3.
X. CONFLICT AND CHANGE IN COLONIAL BRAZIL, 1750-1808.
POMBALINE REFORM AND ITS AFTERMATH. March 8, 10.
FINAL EXAMINATION: March 19, Friday, 7-8:30 p.m. Everyone will answer two of the five or more questions taken from the discussion questions in Topics VI through X (at least one from each topic) for 40% of the course grade.
REQUIRED PAPER: Due 8 March 1993 for 20% of the course grade. See the last page of the syllabus for details.
Attendance at lecture is expected.
I. PORTUGUESE BACKGROUND AND EARLY PORTUGUESE OVERSEAS EXPANSION
Required Reading: Leslie Bethell, ed., Colonial Brazil, pp. 1-13. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792,
pp. 1-46. Bailey W. Diffie and George D. Winius, Foundations of the
Portuguese Empire, 1415-1580. Stuart B. Schwartz, Sugar Plantations in the Formation of
Brazilian Society. Bahia, 1550-1835, pp. 3-15.
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 13-34 [On Reserve].
Discussion Questions [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- By the beginning of the fifteenth century, Portugal, "though
its population was no more than one and a half million . . . had achieved a strongly institutionalized government, a sense of national unity, a basis for modest economic development, commercial and maritime forces eager for a more expansive role in the world, a reorganized military aristocracy seeking new fields of adventure, and firm, calculating leadership able to guide the energies of its followers into major enterprises abroad." Discuss.
- "When the colonization of Brazil began in the 1530s, it
occurred within a larger trading system whose features were already well defined." Discuss. In your answer analyze the role the earlier Portuguese experience in the Atlantic islands, West Africa and Asia played in the development of Brazil in the sixteenth century. In what ways was the colonization of Brazil "a break in the pattern of Portuguese expansion"?
II. THE BRAZILIAN AMERINDIAN AND THE PORTUGUESE RESPONSE
Required Reading: John Hemming, "The Indians of Brazil in 1500," The Cambridge
History of Latin America I, pp. 119-143 [On Reserve]. Leslie Bethell, ed., Colonial Brazil, pp. 145-189. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792,
see index on p. 509 for references to Indians. Stuart B. Schwartz, Sugar Plantations in the Formation of
Brazilian Society. Bahia, 1550-1835, pp. 28-72.
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 229-270 [On Reserve].
Discussion Questions [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- Discuss and analyze the chief characteristics of the
Amerindians whom the Portuguese encountered along the coast of Brazil. What was the Amerindians' role in the brazilwood trade and sugar production? How did the coastal Amerindians' experience with the Portuguese compare with that of the Amerindians in northern Brazil, the Amazon region, Sao Paulo, and southern Brazil? Discuss.
- Discuss and analyze Portuguese attitudes towards and
treatment of the Amerindian, 1500-1808? What was the Amerindian response to the Portuguese? What was the attitude of the Crown toward the Amerindian? of the clergy? of the the Portuguese colonists? Discuss.
III. THE SETTLEMENT OF BRAZIL AND ITS GOVERNANCE, 1500-1750
Required Reading: Leslie Bethell, ed., Colonial Brazil, pp. 13-48. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792,
pp. 53-187. Stuart B. Schwartz, Sugar Plantations in the Formation of
Brazilian Society. Bahia, 1550-1835, pp. 15-27. Francis A. Dutra, "Centralization vs. Donatarial Privilege:
Pernambuco, 1602-1630," in Alden, ed., Colonial Roots of
Modern Brazil, pp. 19-60 [On Reserve].
Dauril Alden, Royal Government in Colonial Brazil. With Special
Reference to the Administration of the Marquis of Lavradio,
Viceroy, 1769-1779, pp. 30-46 [On Reserve].
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 75-161; 175-202 [On Reserve].
Discussion Questions [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- In exchange for settling and defending parts of Brazil,
lords-proprietor (donatarios) were given vast administrative, fiscal and judicial rights and privileges. Describe and analyze the backgrounds of these lords-proprietor and their rights and privileges. Discuss the successes and failures of the lords-proprietor and their successors with a special emphasis on the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries.
- Discuss and analyze the governance of Colonial Brazil, 1500-
- What were the roles of the donatario, the governor and capitao-mor, the governor-general, the judicial bureaucracy, the treasury, the town council (camara), the bishop, the diocesan clergy, the religious clergy, and the military? Did these various officials come into conflict? How? How valid is James Lang's observation: "By organizing and taxing trade, Portugal lived off its American colony without investing the profits in bureaucracies."?
IV. THE SETTLEMENT OF BRAZIL & ITS SOCIETY AND ECONOMY, 1500-1750
Required Reading: Leslie Bethell, ed., Colonial Brazil, pp. 48-144. Stuart B. Schwartz, Sugar Plantations in the Formation of Brazilian Society. Bahia, 1550-1835, pp. 75-241. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792, pp. 138-147; 175-187.
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 75-161; 175-202 [On Reserve].
Discussion Questions [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- "For more than one hundred years sugar ruled Brazil. From
the end of the sixteenth [century] to the beginning of the eighteenth century the cultivation of sugar provided Brazil with its raison d'etre and shaped the society that grew around it. Even after its decline in the colony's total economic production, sugar continued to mold the land of the coastal Northeast and the lives of the people upon it." Discuss. In your answer describe and analyze plantation life and its social and economic characteristics; the roles and interaction of millowners, cane growers, overseers, artisans, and slaves. What role did land tenure and size play?
- Discuss and analyze the type of immigrant (male-female,
geographic and social origins, etc.) who went to Brazil, 1500-1650. What type of social mobility was available? Discuss.
- THE AFRICAN HERITAGE OF COLONIAL BRAZIL
Required Reading:
- J. R. Russell-Wood, The Black Man in Slavery and Freedom in
Colonial Brazil [On Reserve]. Francis A. Dutra, "Blacks and the Search for Rewards and Status
in Seventeenth-Century Brazil," Proceedings of the Pacific Coast Council on Latin American Studies, vol. 6 (1979), pp. 25-35 [On Reserve]. Stuart B. Schwartz, Sugar Plantations in the Formation of
Brazilian Society. Bahia, 1550-1835, pp. 338-412. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792,
pp. 295-322. In addition, see pages cited in index under "Black Slavery" and "Slavery."
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 271-303 [On Reserve].
Discussion Question [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- Based on lecture and the required reading, discuss and
analyze the development of Portuguese attitudes towards Africans, the slave trade, slavery and freedmen, 1440-1808.
VI. THE ROLE OF THE FRONTIER IN COLONIAL BRAZIL
Required Reading: Leslie Bethell, ed., Colonial Brazil, pp. 145-189 (See Topic II). Charles R. Boxer, The Golden Age of Brazil, 1695-1750. Richard M. Morse, ed., The Bandeirantes. The Historical Role of
the Brazilian Pathfinders, especially pp. 3-36 [On Reserve]. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792,
pp. 165-175; 205-206; 211-264; 271-306.
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 171-173; 309-420 [On Reserve].
Discussion Questions [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- What effect, if any, has the Brazilian frontier had on the
development of Portuguese America? How would you analyze the historical role of the bandeirantes and other explorers during Brazil's colonial period? What effect did missionaries, miners, and presidial soldiers have on the frontier? Discuss.
- Based on a careful reading of Charles R. Boxer's The Golden
Age of Brazil, 1695-1750, discuss the effect the discovery of mineral wealth in the late seventeenth century and early eighteenth century had on Brazil's political, economic, and social structure. Then analyze and discuss the major developments in the various regions of Brazil during the "Golden Age."
- Discuss and analyze Spanish, French, English, and Dutch
efforts to benefit from or to conquer or plunder parts of Portuguese America, 1500-1808. What was the Luso-Brazilian response?
VII. GOLD AND THE BRAZILIAN ECONOMY
Required Reading: Leslie Bethell, ed., Colonial Brazil, pp. 190-243. Charles R. Boxer, The Golden Age of Brazil, 1695-1750. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792, pp. 323-337; 433-439.
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 421-443 [On Reserve].
Discussion Questions [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- The discovery of gold and diamonds in the late seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries brought about tremendous change in Colonial Brazil. Discuss and give details and examples. Does this time period deserve to be called the "Golden Age of Brazil"?
- Survey, describe and discuss the major products and the
regions from which (and the time periods during which) they were produced in colonial Brazil. What role did these products play in Brazilian life and in the economy of the Portuguese empire?
- Discuss and analyze the economic (and political) ties between
England and Brazil during the colonial period.
VIII. SOCIETY IN COLONIAL BRAZIL
Required Reading: Leslie Bethell, ed., Colonial Brazil, pp. 135-144. Stuart B. Schwartz, Sugar Plantations in the Formation of
Brazilian Society. Bahia, 1550-1835, pp. 245-337.
- J. R. Russell-Wood, "Female and Family in the Economy and
Society of Colonial Brazil," in Asuncion Lavrin, ed., Latin American Women, pp. 60-100 [On Reserve]. Donald Ramos, "Marriage and Family in Colonial Vila Rica," The
Hispanic American Historical Review, 55:2 (May, 1975), pp. 200-225 [On Reserve]. Charles R. Boxer, The Golden Age of Brazil, 1695-1750. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792,
pp. 339-355; 361-367.
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 305-307; 445-454 [On Reserve].
Discussion Questions [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- Discuss and compare the society that developed in the sugar
areas of coastal Brazil with the society that developed in the mining areas of Minas Gerais, Goias, and Mato Grosso.
- Discuss and analyze society in colonial Brazil. What was the
role of women? the nuclear family? the extended family? How great were the opportunities for social mobility? Discuss.
IX. CHARITY, RELIGION AND CULTURE IN COLONIAL BRAZIL
Required Reading:
- J. R. Russell-Wood, Fidalgos and Philanthropists. The Santa
Casa de Misericordia of Bahia, 1550-1755 (available at Isla Vista Book Store). Francis A. Dutra, "The Brazilian Hierarchy in the Seventeenth
Century," Records of the American Catholic Historical Society, 83: 3-4 (September-December, 1972), pp. 171-186 [On Reserve]. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792,
pp. 196-205; 413-431; 441-456. Eduardo Hoornaert, "The Catholic Church in Colonial Brazil," The
Cambridge History of Latin America I, 541-556 [On Reserve].
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 203-228; 471-512 [On Reserve].
Discussion Questions [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- Based on a careful reading of A. J. R. Russell-Wood, Fidalgos
and Philanthropists, discuss the role of the Misericordia and other lay brotherhoods in Brazil in dealing with such social problems as parentless children, dowryless girls, the sick, the imprisoned, the indigent and the dead. How successful were the various solutions? Discuss.
- Discuss and analyze the structure and role of the Catholic
Church in colonial Brazil. What were its major accomplishments? Its most glaring failures? How effective was its organization? What role did women play? How important was the Inquisition?
- Discuss the development of art, architecture, literature, and
music in colonial Brazil, 1500-1808.
- Evaluate the role of the Jesuits in colonial Brazil. Do you
think their contributions outweighed the charges brought against them by Pombal? Discuss.
- CONFLICT AND CHANGE IN COLONIAL BRAZIL, 1750-1808. POMBALINE
REFORM AND ITS AFTERMATH
Required Reading: Leslie Bethell, ed., Colonial Brazil, pp. 244-343. Stuart B. Schwartz, Sugar Plantations in the Formation of
Brazilian Society. Bahia, 1550-1835, pp. 415-488. Bailey W. Diffie, A History of Colonial Brazil, 1500-1792,
pp. 403-411; 457-469.
Recommended reading: Francis A. Dutra, A Guide to the History of Brazil, 1500-1822,
pp. 439-443; 455-470; 513-545 [On Reserve].
Discussion Questions [Guide to the Required Reading]:
- Draw up a balance sheet for Pombal's Brazilian reforms. In
your answer, discuss how Pombal and his Brazilian viceroys attempted to revamp and modernize the Luso-Brazilian fiscal system, develop new agricultural and extractive industries, and tighten mercantilistic controls to combat contraband trade.
- Discuss and analyze the role of the Enlightenment in late
eighteenth and early nineteenth century Brazil.
- Discuss urban life in Brazil during the colonial period with
a special emphasis on Rio de Janeiro, 1763-1822.
REQUIRED PAPER:
1500-word review paper due 8 March 1993 (for 20% of the
course grade) on either of the following:
Jean de Lery, History of a Voyage to the Land of Brazil
Otherwise Called America;
Dauril Alden, Royal Government in Colonial Brazil. With
Special Reference to the Administration of the Marquis of
Lavradio, Viceroy, 1769-1779 (available at the Isla Vista
Book Store).
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Posted: 16 Sep 1994
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