Book description
Frontiers of Citizenship is an engagingly-written,
innovative history of Brazil's black and indigenous people that redefines our
understanding of slavery, citizenship, and the origins of Brazil's 'racial
democracy'. Through groundbreaking archival research that brings the stories of
slaves, Indians, and settlers to life, Yuko Miki challenges the widespread idea
that Brazilian Indians 'disappeared' during the colonial era, paving the way
for the birth of Latin America's largest black nation. Focusing on the postcolonial
settlement of the Atlantic frontier and Rio de Janeiro, Miki argues that the
exclusion and inequality of indigenous and African-descended people became
embedded in the very construction of Brazil's remarkably inclusive nationhood.
She demonstrates that to understand the full scope of central themes in Latin
American history - race and national identity, unequal citizenship, popular
politics, and slavery and abolition - one must engage the histories of both the
African diaspora and the indigenous Americas.
Reviews
Advance praise: ‘This book is a major achievement not
only because of the innovative research and groundbreaking analysis, but also
because the author has uniquely found a way to communicate these in prose that
is both concise and precise. She effectively articulates theoretical and
epistemological insights in a streamlined way that is certainly helpful to
students and nonspecialists but also, frankly, is useful for specialist
scholars trying to apprehend her reading of the archive. I can sincerely say
that having read this book will forever change the way I think and teach about
Atlantic slavery and Brazilian history, something that I have been doing for
over twenty years.'
Amy Chazkel - Queens College, City University of New
York
Advance praise:‘In Frontiers of Citizenship, Yuko Miki
connects racial categories that hitherto have been archivally and
historiographically separate and argues persuasively why this approach is ‘not
only possible, but necessary'. By intertwining the histories of indigenous
peoples and black slaves in a frontier region, she offers surprising new
insights about race, slavery, and citizenship during Brazil's transition to
nationhood.'
Judy Bieber - University of New Mexico
Advance praise:‘Yuko Miki provides a critical
accounting of nation-state building in nineteenth century Brazil. Surprising
and engaging, Miki tells a series of stories from a variety of perspectives
that bring indigenous peoples into the light. She provides those of us who work
in the modern era on Black-Indian disputes and alliances with an important
backdrop that will inform our work in many years to come. This book would be
excellent for both undergraduate and graduate courses in Brazil, nineteenth
century Latin America, and adds Brazil, a country often left to one side when
discussing indigenous peoples of South America.'
Jan French - University of Richmond
Advance praise:‘In placing together Indians and black
slaves within a complex framework of territorial claims, labor exploitation,
nation-building, and the struggle for and denial of citizenship, Yuko Miki's
book opens a new frontier in the social history of nineteenth-century Brazil
and Latin America in general.'
João José Reis - Universidade Federal da Bahia, author
of Divining Slavery and Freedom.
