As I mentioned in class, there are many Brazilian novellas about Africa and African slaves. Since a good percentage of the country’s population has a very low level of education, researchers and directors usually use the novellas to educate the people about the history of our own country and of the people who helped us build it. Although I could not find a lot of material in English, I did find some descriptions that should be helpful. I will include the links below.
Xica da Silva
A novella about Chica da Silva (Francisca da Silva de Oliveira, 1732-1796), an 18th Century African-Brazilian slave, daughter of a slave woman and a white Portuguese man. Chica was sold to slavery by her white sister, and had many masters (and sons) before being sold to Joao Fernandes de Oliveira, a rich diamond mine owner. They start a romance and Chica is freed by him. They live together (sine they aren’t allowed to be officially married) and have 13 children. The plot of the novella is the fact that Chica will do just about anything to achieve a higher status and be considered white. She paints her face white (as a way of escaping her slave past), exchanges sexual favors for prestige, and even order her slaves (yes, the slave had her own slaves) to pull out a servant’s teeth so she won’t be able to smile at Chica’s husband anymore. The novella has a lot of graphic material, and lots of nudity, but is a great example of how things worked in Colonial Brazil. When banned from the local church, Chica built her own church and palace a few miles away from the city, and paid people to go to mass with her and her servants. I have attached a picture of the couple. This one is a must in the history of slavery in Brazil. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chica_da_Silva
Sinha Moca (Little Missy)
Much different from Xica da Silva, Sinha Moca was a novella about romance and freedom just before the abolition of slaves by Princess Isabel of Portugal. First released in 1986, the second version came out in 2006 (see picture) and had a major impact on how people saw slavery. In Araruna, a small town in the State of São Paulo, Brazil, circa 1886, Sinhá Moça and republican Dr. Rodolfo are engaged in a forbidden love affair. Rodolfo is fighting slavery, and Sinhá Moça, besides being an abolitionist herself, is the daughter of Coronel Ferreira, the Baron of Araruna, a man who is thoroughly pro-slavery. To complicate things further, there appears Rafael, a former slave who earned his freedom, and is, in fact, the result of an obscure relationship between the Baron and his slave. Sinha Moca invades the “senzalas” (place where slaves were kept) at night and lets the slaves escape. The slaves who run away are the firsts to form the Quilombo dos Palmares, a colony of runaway slaves that started a major slave revolution in Brazil. The novella ends with the abolition of slavery in Brazil and the arrival of the Italian immigrants to take care of the coffee production in the country. It also shows how slaves brought capoeira to Brazil, and how they used it. Here is an awesome website that has some great videos of the novella with the soundtrack, and gives you subtitles so you can have an idea of what was going on at the time. Must see! http://www.mysubtitles.com/movie/sinha-moa-a_724756.html
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