U.S. Representations of Brazilian Slavery

In the nineteenth century, slavery was the foremost subject of US travelers narratives in Brazil. In their accounts theaw travelers provided detailed descriptions of the racial hierarchies in Brazil, the work, dress codes, and the diversity of the country's enslaved population coming from various regions of Africa. Also, North American authors revealed the fears and the ways US societies perceived racial mixture by creating short stories based on Brazilian race relations. Some of these stories focused on mulatto men and women who passed as whites in Brazil. In addition, they also explored the ambiguous mulatto identity in the United States. Other US authors represented Brazilian society in popular operas that featured racial mixing as the central theme. This paper discusses how slavery in Brazil was represented in US by travelers and writers who explored the potential popularity of slave life as a form of narrative, including descriptions of enslaved women and racial mixing, by producing and reinforcing ideas about exoticism in the tropical world.