Immigration to Brazil

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Immigration to Brazil

In this thread I will talk a little about the immigration waves that Brazil received in the late 19th century and early 20th century. Throughout its history, Brazil has always been a recipient of immigrants, but this began to gain importance in the late 19th century and throughout the 20th century when the country received massive immigration from Europe, the Middle East and East Asia, which left lasting marks on demography, culture, language and the economy of Brazil.

In general, it is considered that people who entered Brazil up to 1822, the year of independence, were colonizers. Since then, those who entered the independent nation were immigrants. Before 1871, the number of immigrants rarely exceeded two or three thousand people a year. Immigration increased pressure mostly from the end of the international slave trade to Brazil and after the expansion of the economy, especially in the period of large coffee plantations in the state of São Paulo, which contributed to increase the number of immigrants that arrived in the country per year.

Immigration has been a very important demographic factor in the composition, structure and history of human population in Brazil, with all its attending factors and consequences in culture, economy, education, racial issues, etc.


European and Levantine countries ranked accordingly to their immigrant contribution

The countries in the Americas that received a major European immigrants wave from 1871 to 1940, were: the United States (27 million), Argentina (6.5 million), Brazil (6.0 million) and Canada (4 million). There was also a sizable Asian immigration to Brazil, mainly from Japan, but also from Korea, China and Middle East. Asian immigration also had a great impact on Brazilian culture, making of this country with more Japanese after Japan and with one of the biggest Arabic communities in the New World.


Immigration propaganda in Japanese and Italian

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Italian Immigration

Today

According to the Italian government, there are 25 million Brazilians of Italian descent, the largest population of Italian background outside of Italy itself. Many Brazilian politicians, artists, footballers, models and personalities are or were of Italian descent. Amongst Italian-Brazilian one finds several State Governors, Congressmen, mayors and ambassadors. Three Presidents of Brazil were of Italian descent: Pascoal Ranieri Mazzilli, Itamar Franco and Emílio Garrastazu Médici.

Areas of Settlement


Serra Negra in the state of São Paulo (first) and Nova Veneza in the state of Santa Catarina (second) are two cities famous for its Italian influence

Among all Italians who immigrated to Brazil, 70% went to the State of São Paulo. In consequence, São Paulo has more people with Italian ancestry than any region of Italy itself. The rest went mostly to the states of Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Cataria, Rio de Janeiro and Minas Gerais.

Due to the internal migration, many Italians, second and third generations descendants, moved to other areas. In the early 20th century, many rural Italian workers from Rio Grande do Sul migrated to the west of Santa Catarina and then further north to Paraná.

More recently, third and fourth generations have been migrating to other areas; thus it is possible to find people of Italian descent in Brazilian regions where the immigrants had never settled, such as in the Cerrado region of Central-West, in the Northeast and in the Amazon rainforest area, in the extreme North of Brazil.

Places of Origin


Italian Regions

Over half of the Italian immigrants came from Northern Italian regions of Veneto, Lombardy, Tuscany and Emilia-Romagna. About 30% emigrated from Veneto. On the other hand, during the 20th century, Central and Southern Italians predominated in Brazil, coming from the regions of Campania, Abruzzo, Molise, Basilicata and Sicily.

Regions of Origin of Italian Immigrants:

Vêneto 365.710
Campânia 166.080
Calábria 113.155
Lombardia 105.973
Abruzzo-Molise 93.020
Toscana 81.056
Emília-Romagna 59.877
Basilicata 52.888
Sicília 44.390
Piemonte 40.336
Puglia 34.833
Marche 25.074
Lácio 15.982
Úmbria 11.818
Ligúria 9.328
Sardenha 6.113

Total : 1.243.633

History

Situation in Italy:

During the last quarter of the 19th century, the newly united Italy suffered an economic crisis. In the Northern regions, there was unemployment due to the introduction of new techniques in agriculture, while Southern Italy remained underdeveloped and untouched by modernization in agrarian structure. Even in the North, industrialization was still in its initial stages, and illiteracy was still common in Italy (though more in the south and islands than in the north). Thus, poverty and lack of jobs and income stimulated Northern (and also Southern) Italians to emigrate. Most Italian immigrants were very poor rural workers (braccianti).

Situation in Brazil:

In 1850, under British pressure, Brazil finally passed a law that effectively banned transatlantic slave trade. The increased pressure of the abolitionist movement, on the other hand, made clear that the days of slavery in Brazil were coming to an end. Slave trade was in fact effectively suppressed, but the slave system still endured for almost four decades. So the discussion about European immigration to Brazil became a priority for Brazilian landowners. The latter claimed that such migrants were or would soon become indispensable for Brazilian agriculture. They would soon win the argument and mass migration would begin in earnest.

Immigration and Settlement:



Italian immigrants in São Paulo

The Brazilian government (with or following the Emperor's support) had created the first colonies of immigrants (colônias de imigrantes) in the early 19th century. These colonies were established in rural areas of the country, being settled by European families, mainly German immigrants that settled in many areas of Southern Brazil.
The first groups of Italians arrived in 1875, but the boom of Italian immigration in Brazil happened in late 19th century, between 1880 and 1900, when almost one million Italians arrived and headed mostly to São Paulo and Rio Grande do Sul.

A great number of Italians was naturalized Brazilian at the end of the 19th century, when the 'Great Naturalization' conceded automatically citizenship to all the immigrants residing in Brazil prior to November 15, 1889 "unless they declared a desire to keep their original nationality within six months."

During the last years of the 19th century, the denouncements of bad conditions in Brazil increased in the press.
Reacting to the public clamor and many proved cases of mistreatments of Italian immigrants, the government of Italy issued, in 1902, the Prinetti decree forbidding subsidized immigration to Brazil. In consequence, the number of Italian immigrants in Brazil fell drastically in the beginning of the 20th century, but the wave of Italian immigration continued until 1920.

Celebrity Examples:

Bianca Franceschinelli:


Rubens Barrichello:


Isabella Fiorentino:


Emmerson Fittipaldi:


Luana Piovani:


Carmo Dalla Vecchia:

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German Immigration

Today

German Brazilians are now about 12 million people, who live in the entire country, although the overwhelming percentage is found in the country's South Region, mainly in the states of Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina, with lesser but still significant degree in the Southeast Region in areas like São Paulo, Espirito Santo and Rio de Janeiro. German dialects together make up the second most spoken first language in Brazil. A few Brazilian municipalities have Brazilian Hunsrückisch and Germanic Pomeranian as co-official with Portuguese.



Campos do Jordão in the state of São Paulo (first) and Gramado in the state of Rio Grande do Sul (second) are just two examples of many cities in Brazil with German influences.

The German Brazilian areas form, today, a Brazilian region with its own character, made up of towns and large concentrations of residents around the church, commerce and school. These rural villages are connected to major cities where the economy was diversified, adding cottage industries to the original agricultural production.

Areas of Settlement


German colonies in South Brazil

Most of German-Brazilian population lives in the states of Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina, with minor communities in Espirito Santo, São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.

Regions of Origin

Most of German-Brazilians descend from immigrants that came from the Western and Northern Germany, mainly from Rhineland, Hunsrück and Westphalia, but there’s also a sizable contribution from many other regions of Germany, mainly Pomerania, Saxony, Baden-Württemberg and even from Prussia, with also a Volga German contribution.


Pomerode in the state of Santa Catarina is the most German city in Brazil, where Pomeranian German is more spoken than Portuguese itself

History

Many Germans left the German states after the failed revolutions of 1848. Between 1878 and 1892, another 7 million Germans left Germany; after the 1870s Germany was one of the countries from which the largest numbers of people emigrated, the vast majority to the United States.

Germans appeared in fourth place among immigrants to Brazil, but dropped to fifth place when Japanese immigration increased after 1908. It had a notable impact on the ethnic composition of the country, particularly of the Southern Brazilian population. Different factors led to this large influence.

German immigration to Brazil is an old phenomenon which started as early as 1824, many decades before the beginning of the immigration of other European ethnic groups to Brazil. For example, the first significant groups of Italians to immigrate to Brazil only arrived in 1875, many decades after the arrival of the first Germans. When the settlement of other Europeans in Brazil began, the Germans had already been living there for many generations. Another factor was the high birth rates among German Brazilians

When German-speaking immigrants first arrived in Brazil starting at the beginning of the 19th century, they did not identify themselves so much as a unified German-Brazilian group. However, as time went on this common regional identity did emerge for many different geo-socio-political reasons.

Germans immigrated mainly from what is now Germany, but also from other countries where German communities were established. From 1824 to 1969, around 250,000 Germans emigrated to Brazil, being the fourth largest immigrant community to settle in the country, after the Portuguese, Italians and Spaniards. About 30% of them arrived between World War I and World War II.

Only a minority of German Brazilians were Germanists. Most German Brazilians did not consider it important to be connected to Germany through associations or political parties. Despite attempts by Germanists to attract the population of German origin in churches or schools, few of them followed these ideas. This was evident in the failure of the Nazi Party when trying to attract a following among German Brazilians. During the World War II many Germans and their descendants (as well as Italians and Japanese) were persecuted in Brazil.


Oktoberfest in Santa Cruz do Sul

Celebrity Examples

Rodrigo Hilbert:


Giselle Bündchen:


Mano Menezes (Luiz Venker):


Anna Hickmann:


Carolina Dieckmann:


Odilon Wagner

  

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Portuguese Immigration

Today

About 5 million people in Brazil have recent Portuguese ancestry, and other dozen of million have Portuguese ancestry dating back to colonial times. Brazil was colonized by Portugal, and both countries share Portuguese, Roman Catholicism, and many traditions.

The more recent immigrant groups of Portuguese in Brazil keep a close relation with Portugal and the Portuguese culture mainly through the Casa de Portugal. Several events also take place to maintain cultural interchange between Portuguese and Brazilian students, and between the Portugal and the Portuguese community in Brazil. There are many Portuguese associations (Associações Portuguesas) in Brazil like the Beneficência Portuguesa and many other institutions preserve the cultural heritage of the Portuguese community like the Real Gabinete and the Liceu Literário Português.

Areas of Settlement


Ourto Preto, state of Minas Gerais, 18th century Portuguese colonial style.

Since Brazil was a Portuguese colony, Portuguese settled in all the Brazilian regions. However, if we consider only the recent immigration from the 19th and 20th centuries, they main regions these immigrants settled were in the states of Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo and Rio Grande do Sul.

Azoreans predominate in Rio Grande do Sul and continental Portuguese, mainly Nothern and Central, predominate in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.

Regions of Origins


Portuguese Immigrants, early 20th century

Immigration from Nothern and Central Portuguese regions was predominat, both in the colonial times and in the post-Industrial Revolution period:

Portuguese emigration at the end of the 19th century to Brazil

Region - Percentage
Beira Litoral - 25%
Beira Alta - 22,6%
Douro Litoral - 17%
Trás-os-Montes - 14,5%
Minho - 13%
Estremadura - 6,3%
Baixo Tejo - 0,6%
Beira Baixa - 0,5%
Ribatejo - 0,5%
Algarve - 0,4%
Alto Alentejo - 0,1%

History


Colonial Brazil map.

By the mid-16th century, Portuguese colonists were already settling in significant numbers, mainly along the coastal regions of Brazil. Numerous cities were established, including Salvador (1549), São Paulo (1554) and Rio de Janeiro (1565). While most Portuguese (and predominantly male) settlers came willingly, some were forced exiles or [I]degredados. Such convicts were sentenced for a variety of crimes according to the [I]Ordenações do Reino, which included common theft, attempted murder and adultery.

Many decades later, a few years after independence from Portugal in 1822, Portuguese people would start arriving in Brazil as immigrants and not as colonists. The Portuguese population in Brazil actually increased. Most of them were peasants from the rural areas of Portugal. The majority settled in urban centres, mainly in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, working mainly as small traders or shopkeepers.


The port-city of Santos, state of São Paulo, was the city where most of immigrants passed through when they came to Brazil in the 20th century

More Recently, In the first six months of 2011, with the economic crisis in Portugal and several other European Union member states, including Spain, Italy, Ireland and Greece, a record number of 328,826 Portuguese citizens made their situation regular in Brazil. One of the reasons which explained this rise in Portuguese immigration to Brazil was the economic crisis in Portugal, where unemployment rate rose to over 12,5%. In that period, the Portuguese lead the numbers of foreigners making their situation regular in Brazil.

Celebrity Examples

Maitê Proença:


Gabriel Braga Nunes:


Tancredo Neves:


Fernanda Montenegro:

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Spanish Immigration

Today

Spanish immigration was the third largest among immigrant groups in Brazil; about 750,000 immigrants entered Brazil from Spanish ports. Numbers of Spaniards coming to Brazil before independence are unknown. There are about 15 million Spanish-Brazilians nowadays, concentrated in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.

Areas of Settlement.



São José do Rio preto (first) and Catanduva (second), both in the state of São Paulo, are famous for their sizeable Spanish community.

The main area of destination for Spaniards was the state of São Paulo, although the percentages of attraction to this state vary between 66% and 78% in different sources. The second largest contingent was deployed in Rio de Janeiro, while other states such as Minas Gerais, Rio Grande do Sul, Paraná, Mato Grosso, Pará and Bahia received smaller groups. Most Spaniards in Brazil came from the Galicia and Andalusia regions of Spain. Galician smallholders settled mainly in urban areas of Brazil. Starting in the early 20th century, most Spanish immigrants were Andalusian peasants who worked in the coffee plantations, mainly in rural areas of São Paulo State.

Regions of Origins


Nova Granada, state of São Paulo. Named after the Spanish city of Granada.

In all Brazilian states, the immigrants from Galicia predominated, and those were predominantly males, who emigrated alone, settled in urban centers and paid for their passage by ship. The only exception was the state of São Paulo, destination for the vast majority of the Spaniards, about 75% of the total. In São Paulo, 60% were from Andaluzia, and only 20% from Galicia. Those had their passage by ship paid by the Brazilian government, emigrated in families and were taken to the coffee farms to replace the African slave manpower.

History

Spanish emigration peaked in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and it was concentrated to Argentina and Cuba. Between 1882 and 1930, 3,297,312 Spaniards emigrated, of whom 1,594,622 went to Argentina and 1,118,960 went to Cuba. Brazil only started to be an important destination for immigrants from Spain in the 1880s, and the country received the third largest number of immigrants from that country, after Argentina and Cuba. Spaniards also made up the third largest national group to immigrate to Brazil, after the Italians and Portuguese.

Between 1840 and 1849, only 10 Spaniards immigrated to Brazil, 181 between 1850 and 1859, 633 between 1860 and 1869 and 3,940 between 1870 and 1879. The arrivals suddenly grew between 1880 and 1889, when 29,166 Spaniards arrived. Spanish immigration to Brazil was a direct result of the efforts of the Brazilian government to attract European workers to the country, in order to “whiten” the Brazilian population and to replace the African manpower.

The Brazilian government spent large amounts of money paying passages of European immigrants by ship (subsidized immigration). A huge propaganda was conducted by the Brazilian government in Spain, with agents that worked for it (ganchos) who went to the country in order to persuade Spaniards to immigrate to Brazil. The Brazilian government offered the free travel by ship to Brazil, and that was decisive in attracting immigrants.

Brazil was a country far less attractive than Argentina and Cuba, countries with which the Spaniards maintained cultural relations. Moreover, the working conditions in Brazil were much worse. Thus, the Spaniards who emigrated to Brazil were those who could not afford to pay a passage by ship to Cuba and Argentina, the poorest ones, and took advantage of the offer of free travel to Brazil. For the wretched Spanish peasants, the free passage by ship offered by the Brazilian government seemed a great opportunity to leave poverty.


The region of Ribeirão Preto in NW São Paulo was the place where most of Spanish settled.

It is estimated that since Brazil's independence (1822) some 750,000 Spaniards have entered Brazil. This figure represents between 12.5% and 14% of all foreigners entering Brazil since its independence and puts the Spaniards in the third place among immigrants in Brazil, behind the Portuguese and Italians.

Immigrants of Spanish origin were among those who had a higher rate of permanent residence in Brazil, overtaken by the Japanese but above nationalities such as Portuguese, Italian or German. This may be due to the large number of families traveling with passage paid by the Brazilian government that left their native Spain to work on coffee plantations of the state of São Paulo. Most Spaniards entered Brazil between 1880 and 1930, with the peak period between 1905 and 1919, when they overcome the entry of Italians.

Celebrity Examples

Luciana Gimenez:


Millôr Fernandes:


Raul Cortez:


Nélida Piñón:

 

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Polish Immigration

Today

The number of Polish descendants in Brazil is estimated at 1.8 million. The State of Paraná still remains a strong influence from the Polish culture. Many small towns have a majority of Polish-descendants and the Polish language is spoken by some of them, although nowadays most Polish Brazilians only speak Portuguese. The city of Curitiba has the second largest Polish diaspora in the world (after Chicago) and Polish music, dishes and culture are quite common in the region.



First: House in old-Polish style, Curitiba, state of Paraná. Second: Curitiba, capital of the state of Paraná

Areas of Settlement.

After the proclamation of the Republic, the Brazilian government practically opened the doors of the country to immigration. In the first years of the Republic, the greatest immigration to Brazil occurred. The Polish appeared in the statistics in significant numbers. This period was known in Poland as "Brazilian fever". Important Polish communities appeared in several Brazilian states:

-Paraná: Eufrosina, Rio Claro, São Mateus, Santa Bárbara, Prudentópolis, Ivaí, Apucarana (now Cândido de Abreu), Castro, Piraí do Sul, Palmeira, Cruz Machado, Guarapuava, Irati, Curitiba and others.
-Santa Catarina: Lucena (current Itaiópolis), Rio Vermelho, Massaranduba, Grã-Pará, Nova Galícia, Brusque and others.
-Rio Grande do Sul: Alfredo Chaves (now Veranópolis), Antônio Prado, Bento Gonçalves, Dom Feliciano, Mariana Pimentel, Ijuí, Guaraní das Missões, Áurea, Gaurama, Jaguari, Erechim, and others.
-São Paulo: São Bernardo, Pariquera-açu, City of São Paulo, and others.
-Espírito Santo: Águia Branca, Santa Leopoldina, and others.


Polish church in Brusque, state of Santa Catarina.

Regions of Origins

Brazil received Poles from all over the country, but mainly from Pomerania, Silesia, Carpathia and from big urban centres like Warszawa, Lublin and Kraków. Polish-controlled parts of Lithuania such as Kaunas (then Kovno) also contributed with a sizeable number of immigrants.

History

The first Polish immigrants arrived in the port of Itajaí, Santa Catarina, in August 1869. They were 78 Poles from the area of Southern Silesia. Commandant Redlisch, of the ship Victoria, brought people from Eastern Europe to settle in Brusque.

Brusque, in the State of Santa Catarina, received many Polish immigrants.They were in total 16 families, among them: Francisco Pollak, Nicolau Wós, Boaventura Pollak, Thomasz Szymanski, Simon Purkot, Felipe Purkot, Miguel Prudlo, Chaim Briffel, Simon Otto, Domin Stempke, Gaspar Gbur, Balcer Gbur, Walentin Weber, Antoni Kania, Franciszek Kania, André Pampuch and Stefan Kachel. The Poles were placed in the colonies Príncipe Dom Pedro and Itajaí, in the area of Brusque.

Polish immigration to Brazil was not as large as the immigration of Portuguese or Italians, however a significant number of Poles have settled in Brazil. From 1872 to 1959, 110,243 "Russian" citizens entered Brazil. In fact, the vast majority of them were Poles, since Poland was under Russian rule and ethnic Poles immigrated with Russian passports.


Polish immigrants in the port of the city of Santos, state of São Paulo.

The State of Paraná received the majority of Polish immigrants, who settled mainly in the region of Curitiba, in the towns of Mallet, Cruz Machado, São Matheus do Sul, Irati, and União da Vitória.
Most Polish immigrants to Southern Brazil were Catholics who arrived between 1870–1920 and worked as small farmers in the State of Paraná. Others went to the neighboring states of Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina and São Paulo, which is a state as well as a city. After the 1920s, many Polish Jews immigrated seeking refuge from Europe, settling mainly in the State of São Paulo. Today most Brazilian Jews are of Polish descent.

Celebrity Examples

Xuxa (Szusza!):


Ricardo Lewandowski (Cunt):


Thais Paczolek:


Edson Zwaricz:

 

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British and Irish Immigration

Today

There are about 20.000 British and Irish Brazilians nowadays. The main cores of the British-Brazilian culture are São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.



Paranapiacaba village is an old British town that dates back to the Imperial times, located in the countryside of the state of São Paulo.

Areas of Settlement

Most of British immigrants settled in the state of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Paraná. In São Paulo they settled in the southern half of the state and in the capital city, in Rio de Janeiro they settled in the capital city and in Paraná most of British communities are found on the northern half of the state.

Regions of Origins

British and Irish came from all the over the Islands, so there isn’t a region of predominance, with exception of the Irish, who came mostly from Dublin. As for the British, Scottish and Southern English were the regions that most of British-Brazilians descend. Brazil also received some Welsh immigration, mainly to Rio Grande do Sul in the 19th century and to São Paulo after WWI and WWII.

History

British are in Brazil since Imperial times. During the years of the Brazilian Empire many British came to Brazil to make their lives in many different ways. Many rich and powerful British industrials, businessmen and bank holders came to Brazil in this time.

The main British impact and legacy from the Imperial age is the railroad system they built. Most of the early railroads in Brazil were built by British companies, and in this time many British engineers migrated to Brazil. One example is the São Paulo Railway Company, responsible for building and managing the railroads in the province of São Paulo.



São Paulo Railway Company plate (first) and Old steam locomotive carrying a British flag, used for tourist purposes (second).

It was also during the last days of the Brazilian Empire that many Irish came to Brazil, most being males that would join the army and fight in the Cisplatine War (1825-1828). Many of Irish immigrants in Brazil had to change their last names into an easier kind of writing based in existing Portuguese names, replacing the "O'" (originally "grandson").

Regarding the Welsh, we can mention Thomas Benbow Phillips (1829 - 1915), who was a pioneer of the Welsh settlements in Brazil and, more successfully, Patagonia during the 19th century. He was born in either Manchester or Tregaron, where he grew up. Living in Manchester in 1848, he came into contact with cotton traders, who were eager to establish a colony in Brazil to grow cotton for their mills in Lancashire. Phillips travelled to Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil to begin making arrangements, and by the end of May 1851 had been joined by six groups of Welsh immigrants.

Phillips married a Brazilian woman, María Januaria Buena Florinal, but after her death in 1872 moved to the larger Welsh colony of Y Wladfa, that is a Welsh settlement in Argentina, which began in 1865 and occurred mainly along the coast of Chubut Province in the far southern region of Patagonia. Other groups of Welsh people also migrated to Chile, Argentia and Brazil after the WWII in smaller numbers.
The second migratory flux of British immigrants happened in the post WWII period. Many British came to Brazil, and now the immigrants were humble people seeking for a new life. Even though most of the British in this time went to countries within the Anglosphere, many came to South America, mainly to Argentina, Brazil and Chile.



Charles Miller (first) and Charles Miller street, São Paulo (second). Born to a Scottish father and to an English mother in São Paulo, he introduced football in Brazil.

São Paulo is the state where most of the British-Brazilian population is concentrated, even though many can be found in Rio de Janeiro. The main difference is that while in Rio de Janeiro it predominates the Imperial-age immigration, in São Paulo it predominates the post-WWII immigration. São Paulo nowadays has lots of pubs and British cultural centres such as the Saint Andrew Society of São Paulo, where the members of the British diaspora try to keep their culture alive.


Pipers gathering at Ibirapuera Park, São Paulo

Celebrity Examples

Giovanna Ewbank:


Eduardo Smith (Supla):


[B]Helena Morley:


Richard Dave Court (Ritchie):

 

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Lithuanian Immigration

Today

Nowadays there are about 200.000 Lithuanian-Brazilians, concentrated in the states of São Paulo, Paraná, Rio Grande do Sul and Rio de Janeiro.




Vila Zelina is the Lithuanian neighbourhood of São Paulo city: Vila Zelina Church (first), Lithuanian dishes in a restaurant (second) and a replica of the Freedom Monument, that stays in Vilnius (third)

Areas of Settlement

Most of Lithuanian-Brazilians can be found in the state of São Paulo, mainly in the capital city and in the city of Ribeirão Preto. Big communities can also be found in Rio Grande do Sul and Rio de Janeiro.

Regions of Origins

Lithuanians came from all over the country to Brazil, however most of them came from the cities of Kaunas and Vilnius, with also a sizable portion from Klaipeda (Memel).

History

The first Lithuanian to set foot on Brazilian soil, according to a record dated in 1866, was a certain colonel Andrius Višteliauskas. His mission was to aid the Brazilian armed forces in the Paraguayan War that was going on at that time. His experience in Brazil must have influenced people in his homeland, perhaps by his writings or perhaps after he traveled home. Therefore, a few years later a group of Lithuanian immigrants and their families arrived in Brazil. In 1890, twenty-five Lithuanian families entered the land of Brazil. Their destination was the newly established colony of Ijuí, situated on the red and fertile soil of the northwestern part of the state of Rio Grande do Sul.

Today the city of Ijuí is a prosperous town, based on Brazilian standards. From early on Ijuí was settled by peoples of different ethno-linguistic backgrounds, unlike some other towns in the region. For example, the town of Guaraní das Missões was settled mostly by Polish immigrants. On the other hand, Germans, who came from the old German colonies (the Altkolonie) located in the eastern part of the state, went on to settle the municipality of Cerro Largo (formerly known as Serro Azul) and to make it into the small town that it is today.

One can still meet descendants from that first group of Lithuanian immigrants that settled in the Ijuí area. In 1926, around thirty thousand Lithuanian immigrants arrived in Brazil. They went to work in the many coffee plantations (fazendas) throughout the State of São Paulo. Other groups of immigrants also were lured into the country at the time to fulfill labor shortages. São Paulo may have been the destination of most Lithuanians but they also went to settle in other states such as Rio de Janeiro and Paraná. The town of Castro, in Paraná, a state south of São Paulo, boasts that amongst Japanese, Russians and other ethnic groups their town was also founded by Lithuanian immigrants.

The slaves of Brazil had been freed in 1888. More and more in the following decades the coffee barons of the land tried to obtain laborers from other sources, mostly from White European sources.


Ribeirão Preto in the countryside of São Paulo received many Lithuanian immigrants

It is very much doubtful that the Lithuanian immigrants settled in São Paulo ever had any contact with their compatriots who had established themselves further south in the state of Rio Grande do Sul a few decades earlier. However, in São Paulo Lithuanians developed strong social ties around church congregations. Most were Catholic but many also participated in Lutheran church services.

In 1930, the núcleo (small colony) of Barão de Antonina, was established in Itaporanga, São Paulo. The center of Lithuanian life in Brazil is Vila Zelina, a district in one of the biggest megalopolies of the world – the city of São Paulo. Everything seems to revolve around the Saint Joseph Catholic Church (São José). One can still taste some of the culinary of the Old World in this part of town. Easter eggs are still celebrated in the traditional way.

Celebrity Examples

Marcos Aidukaitis:


Angélica Ksyvickis:


Victor Siaulys:

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Jewish Immigration

Today

There are about 96,500 Jews in Brazil today. The current Jewish community is mostly composed of Ashkenazi Jews of Polish and German descent and also Sephardic Jews of Spanish, Portuguese, and North African descent; among the North African Jews, a significant number are of Egyptian descent.

Brazilian Jews play an active role in politics, sports, academia, trade and industry, and are overall well integrated in all spheres of Brazilian life. Jews lead an open religious life in Brazil and there are rarely any reported cases of anti-semitism in the country. In the main urban centers there are schools, associations and synagogues where Brazilian Jews can practice and pass on Jewish culture and traditions.[/COLOR]


Centre of Jewish Culture of São Paulo, shaped after the Torah

Areas of Settlement

The majority of Brazilian Jews live in the State of São Paulo, mainly in the capital city, but there are also sizeable communities in the States of Rio de Janeiro, Rio Grande do Sul, Minas Gerais, and Paraná.
Brazil today has the 10th largest Jewish community in the world and the 4th largest in Americas.


Higienópolis is the main Jewish Neighbourhood of São Paulo

Regions of Origins

Most of the Sephardic Jews who came to Brazil were Portuguese, while most of the Ashkenazi Jews were Polish, German, Lithuanian and Russian.

History

Jews started settling in Brazil ever since the Inquisition reached Portugal in the 16th century. They arrived in Brazil during the period of Dutch rule, setting up in Recife the first synagogue in the Americas as early as 1636. Most of those Jews were Sephardic Jews who had fled the Inquisition in Spain and Portugal to the religious freedom of the Netherlands. Adam Smith attributed much of the development of Brazil's sugar industry and cultivation to the arrival of Portuguese Jews who were forced out of Portugal during the inquisition.


Kahal Zur Israel Synagogue in Recife was the first Synagogue in Americas

It is estimated that at least 17 million Brazilians have Sephardic Jewish ancestry, most of whom are to be found to the northeast of the country. DNA testing has revealed that some Portuguese males have Sephardic ancestry; thus many Brazilians, most of whom have a degree of Portuguese ancestry, are also of Jewish ancestry, although most would not say so.


Beit Chabad of São Paulo was built after the Jewish Cultural Centre of New York

Waves of Jewish immigration occurred during the rise of Nazis in Europe. By the 1930’s, another wave of immigration brought thousands of Ashkenazi Jews arrived in Brazil. These new comers were mostly Polish, Lithuanian, German and Russian Jews, who settled mostly in São Paulo. Most of the current Jewish population in Brazil is Ashkenazi.

Celebrity Examples

Dan Stulbach:


Debora Bloch:


Tiago Leifert:


Deborah Colker:


Rabbi Henry Sobel:

[Catarinense1998]

Good thread.Even the South Region is the most white, the biggest part of our heritage come from imigrants who came hete before this big wave.Azoreans 1746-1753, germans 1850 Blumenau and 1851 Joinville; some germans settlements near the litoral like São Pedro de Alcântara in 1829.Italians are biggest group that came to SC, but it is in later 19 century.