RESEARCH ARTICLES   

From the Top of the Racial Pyramid in Hawai’i: Demonizing the Hawaiian Portuguese in Elvira Osorio Roll’s Fiction 

 Reinaldo Silva
Universidade de Aveiro   

Abstract . This essay reassesses Crèvecoeur’s theory of assimilation-the melting-pot-turned “melting-love” via Israel Zangwill and Sollors as a means to eradicate racism in America. It also analyzes the ways in which the representations of the Portuguese in American fiction were shaped by social Darwinist discourse, as well as how Elvira Osorio Roll in her novels, Background: A Novel of Hawaii and Hawaii’s Kohala Breezes, draws from this type of racial discourse in her own representation of the Portuguese in Hawai’i.     

(pp 7-32)

Dislocation and Repossession in O Navio dos Negros, Jorge Silva Melo’s Theatrical Reading of Benito Cereno 

Diana V. Almeida  and Margarida Vale de Gato
University of Lisbon   

Abstract. Comparing Navio dos Negros, Jorge Silva Melo’s adaptation of Benito Cereno in 2000 (Lisbon, Culturgest) to Melville’s narrative, several plots of dislocation and repossession emerge. In Melville, the core tale of the Atlantic slave trade initiated by the Iberian diasporic experience sustains the plot of the slaveholder’s ambiguous claim to oppression and protection and interferes with the American narrator’s exegetic endeavors. Social identity mapping becomes problematic in a comedy of errors that multiplies possible readings and foregrounds the trappings of authority and authorship. In fact, though the “Spaniards” may be taken as a synecdoche for the colonizer, the Portuguese are relegated to the social and linguistic margins, namely in the passage of the text where a revelation of (some) mystery is hinted at but remains encrypted in a foreign language. The play by Silva Melo expands and disrupts the semantics of diaspora by creating a contemporary parallel narrative in which the Portuguese are consigned to the role of oppressors of modern-day immigrants from Eastern European countries and from the former Portuguese colonies. However, the political message of guilt and victimization is upset by the deceptive layers of storytelling that the stage director takes from Melville, thus foregrounding the narrative’s textual fabric. With a minimalistic set-design, where the few props are constantly being reassembled as the storytellers interweave the narrative, the actors (Silva Melo’s Artistas Unidos) are both readers and narrators, who invite the audience to question authoritative interpretations.   
Keywords: Artistas Unidos, diaspora, Melville, postcolonialism, storytelling, textual diaspora       

(pp 33-44)

Paulo Ricardo Kralik Angelini
 Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul  
Resumo. O tempo. A espera. O relógio que corre em giros contrários. Um silêncio que grita e sangra. O romance O retorno, da portuguesa Dulce Maria Cardoso, traz o triste relato de Rui, um menino adolescente que narra a viagem de uma família decepada pela angústia e pelo medo, no processo de descolonização que atingiu mais de 500 mil pessoas que deixaram as ex-colônias e regressaram à Metrópole. Regressaram a um Portugal sem lugar para muitos deles. A narrativa de Dulce Maria Cardoso descontrói a tão mitificada revolução de abril e expõe seus efeitos corrosivos. Somos apresentados a um Portugal desgovernado, que não sabe como lidar com seus homens e familiares que atuavam na África. Movimento e migração definem a nossa humanidade, do ponto de vista social e histórico, afirma David Goldberg. Em Portugal, uma nação expansionista, receber de volta seus filhos desbravadores e os frutos da colonização é tarefa difícil. Este trabalho pretende fazer uma leitura de O retorno a partir da temática da descolonização, com base teórica alicerçada a partir de obras de Eduardo Lourenço e Stuart Hall, entre outros. Para Eduardo Lourenço, Portugal é uma nação-barca carregada de passado e de saudade. Portugal, uma potência expansionista, dos bravos guerreiros que viajavam pelo mundo em cavalos e em naus, levando o nome da fé cristã, varre, agora, para debaixo do tapete, toda uma geração sem lugar, sem espaço nem tempo.   

 Palavras-chave. Descolonização, literatura portuguesa contemporânea, identidade; migração; nação  

(pp 45-60)

 Abstract. Time. Waiting. The clock that spins backwards. A silence that screams and bleeds. The Novel, The Return, by Portuguese writer Dulce Maria Cardoso, brings us the sad story of Rui, an adolescent boy who narrates the journey of a family gripped by anguish and fear, during the process of decolonization that encompassed more than 500,000 people who left the former colonies and returned to the Metropolis. They returned to a Portugal that had no room for many of them. Dulce Maria Cardoso’s narrative deconstructs the much mythologized revolution of April and exposes its corrosive effects. We are introduced to a runaway Portugal, which does not know how to deal with its men and relatives who had worked in Africa. Movement and migration define our humanity from a social and historical point of view, affirms David Golderbg. In Portugal, an expansionist nation, the return of those who had settled in Africa is a challenging task.This paper intends to analyze The Return departing from a thematic of decolonization, with a theoretical basis grounded on the works of Eduardo Lourenço and Stuart Hall, among others. For Eduardo Lourenço, Portugal is a nation-boat loaded with a past and a yearning. Portugal-an expansionist power of brave warriors, who travelled the world on horses and ships, carrying the name of the Christian faith-now sweeps under the rug an entire generation without a place, space, or time.   

  Keywords. Decolonization, contemporary Portuguese literature, identity, migration, nation   

Sharing Status and Appropriating Identity: The Case of the Conselho da Diaspora Portuguesa
Sandi Michele de Oliveira 

University of Copenhagen   

 Abstract. On 26 December 2012 President Cavaco Silva announced the creation of the Conselho da Diáspora Portuguesa, an association of 300 “notable” (notáveis) Portuguese to be individually invited by the Council’s Board. Their function will be to service as lobbyists working to improve the country’s image in the world. In other words, and according to the Council’s President Filipe de Botton, the Conselho da Diáspora Portuguesa will be able to “take advantage of the best that Portugal has to offer outside Portugal.” Through remittances, Portuguese emigrants have long been a source of economic benefit to their relatives in Portugal as well as to the needs of the Portuguese Government.  This initiative, however, is different; here, in addition to direct economic benefits that the Council’s members may provide, their identity itself as successful Portuguese is put into play. Using tools from discourse analysis, this article examines the presentation of the Council and its objectives, as well as the characterization of its members, by Portuguese President Cavaco Silva and Council President Felipe de Botton on the occasion of the Council’s establishment, with comparisons to Cavaco Silva’s speeches on the Day of Portugal, Camões and the Portuguese Communities (10 June 2013). The study focuses specifically on strategies of legitimization and delegitimization of Portuguese transnationals.   

  Keywords: Identity, discourse, citizenship, legitimization, status

(pp 61-77)