The Color of Modernity: São Paulo and the Making of Race and Nation in Brazil

473 Pages·2015·4.071 MB·English

by  Barbara Weinstein

THE COLOR OF MODERNITY
A book in the series
Radical Perspectives: A Radical History Review book series
series editors: daniel j. walkowitz, new york university
barbara weinstein, new york university
BARBARA WEINSTEIN
THE COLOR OF
MODERNITY
São Paulo and the
Making of Race and
Nation in Brazil
duke university press durham and london 2015
© 2015 Duke University Press
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America on acid- free paper o
Designed by Heather Hensley
Typeset in Whitman and Univers by Graphic Composition, Inc.,
Bogart, Georgia
Library of Congress Cataloging- in-Publication Data
Weinstein, Barbara.
The color of modernity : São Paulo and the making of race and nation in
Brazil / Barbara Weinstein.
pages cm — (Radical pespectives: a radical history review book series)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-0-8223-5762-9 (hardcover : alk. paper)
isbn 978-0-8223-5777-3 (pbk. : alk. paper)
isbn 978-0-8223-7615-6 (e-book)
1. São Paulo (Brazil : State)—History—20th century. 2. São Paulo (Brazil :
State)—History—Revolution, 1932. 3. São Paulo (Brazil : State)—Race
relations—History. 4. Racism—Brazil—São Paulo (State) 5. Brazil—
History—20th century. I. Title. II. Series: Radical perspectives.
f2361.w456 2015
305.800981(cid:2)61—dc23
2014040373
Cover art: mmdc poster (detail), 1932.
For Sarah and Danny

CONTENTS
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
chapter 1: Paulista Modern 27
PART I: THE WAR OF SÃO PAULO
chapter 2: Constituting Paulista Identity 71
chapter 3: The Middle Class in Arms?
Fighting for São Paulo 110
chapter 4: Marianne into Battle?
The Mulher Paulista and the Revolution of 1932 161
chapter 5: Provincializing São Paulo:
The “Other” Regions Strike Back 192
PART II: COMMEMORATING SÃO PAULO
chapter 6: São Paulo Triumphant 221
chapter 7: Exhibiting Exceptionalism: History
at the IV Centenário 267
chapter 8: The White Album: Memory, Identity,
and the 1932 Uprising 296
Epilogue and Conclusion 331
Notes 345
Bibliography 419
Index 445

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Outside of academia, anyone embarking on a new enterprise—a software
startup, a housing development, a widget factory—is likely to incur a certain
degree of fi nancial indebtedness. But we academics deal in a different cur-
rency; in the course of doing research, we usually accumulate intellectual,
not fi nancial, debts, and our moral economy dictates that we repay what we
owe with our own peculiar bitcoin: profuse expressions of gratitude in the
book’s acknowledgments. Having run up an enormous bill over the many
years during which I have researched and written this book, in the next few
pages I will try to acquit myself honorably and metaphorically reimburse the
many friends and colleagues to whom I am, in truth, forever indebted. But
I worry that there will be some people who, early on, suggested sources or
offered ideas whose origin I’ve long since forgotten; it’s even possible that,
against my better scholarly judgment, I’ve tricked myself into thinking that
I came up with a particular idea all by myself. The eminent sociologist Rob-
ert K. Merton, apparently disgruntled that his colleagues were not citing him
quite enough, termed a larger-s cale version of this process “obliteration by
incorporation”—by which he meant the way certain ideas get so embedded
in the disciplinary “common sense” that they become untraceable to their
original “inventor.” Unlike Merton, I’m inclined to regard ideas as emerging
from a collective process, not one individual person’s “genius,” so I’m hoping
I can count on the generosity of the academic community and assume that
my colleagues will not feel too “obliterated” should I inadvertently neglect to
thank them for some excellent idea or suggestion that richly deserves to be
acknowledged but whose origins have been rendered obscure by time.
There are three people who have been exceptionally supportive at various
points in my ongoing struggle to fi nish this book, and to whom I owe an espe-