An Ethnography of the Lives of Japanese and Japanese Brazilian Migrants. Ethel V. Kosminsky
as a nation. It already had its own culture, language, and religion, so it was logical for the policy of immigration to favor immigrants of Latin origin, such as those from Spain, Portugal, and Italy. German immigrants threatened the consolidation of the Brazilian nation. The hierarchy of white European immigrants obeyed a different criterion: they should belong to the “Latin civilization” and be able to assimilate into the Brazilian population. Other intellectuals criticized Portuguese immigrants because of their trade vocations and their hatred of agriculture. However, this did not prompt them to exclude Portuguese from coming to Brazil. Brazilian workers were considered racially inferior in the Brazil Empire as well as the Brazilian Republic, both before and after the emancipation of slaves in 1888 (Seyferth 1996: 44–56).
Private immigration companies were criticized for funneling Japanese immigrants directly to São Paulo coffee plantations owners. The arrival of the first Japanese immigrants 1908 increased the debate on the dangers of Asian immigration. As previously stated, Brazilian nationalists abhorred non-white immigration and, as such, Chinese, Hindu, and Japanese people were seen as descending from decadent civilizations that would impede the historical goal of Brazilian whitening and superior racial formation (Seyferth 1996: 56–57).
German and Swiss immigrants who went to work for São Paulo coffee plantation owners faced such mistreatment that Prussia and other German states prohibited further immigration to São Paulo State in 1859 through the Restrito von der Heydt (Richter 1986: 15). Until this law was revoked in 1896 (Richter 1986: 20), Germans were only allowed to immigrate to the southern states not to São Paulo.
Italians encountered similar hardships, compelling the Italian government to prohibit subsidized immigration to São Paulo coffee plantations under the Decreto Prinetti in 1902. According to this decree, some ships were prevented from transporting Italian emigrants without payment in advance. But São Paulo coffee plantation owners adjusted to the new situation by no longer paying for families’ tickets (Alvim 1986: 53). The Italian government, due to regular non-compliance with the Decreto Prinetti, decided in 1905 that those who wanted to immigrate to Brazil would have to pay for their passage or have tickets already paid for and sent by family members. However, this political decision prevented few people from traveling to Italy in order to pay for the emigrants’ tickets (Alvim 1986: 59). This situation changed only when the United States replaced Brazil as the preferred destination of Italians at the turn of the century (Alvim 1986: 60).
Both the Brazilian imperial government in the nineteenth century and the republic in the twentieth century opposed Japanese immigration, considering it to be “the yellow danger.” Plantation owners, intellectuals, and the São Paulo state government, too, preferred immigrants to be white Europeans rather than Asians, in order to further whiten the Brazilian population through miscegenation. These groups envisioned a modern Brazil based on the white race and European civilization. In this racist ideology, Chinese, Hindu, and Japanese people represented decaying civilizations that would only hinder the “advancement” they saw as necessary in Brazil (Seyferth 1996: 56–57). However, the government made no effort to prevent the first Japanese immigrants from arriving in 1908, hired to replace African slave labor and replenish the dwindling supply of white European workers for São Paulo’s coffee plantations.
The Arrival of Japanese Immigrants
Brazilians were surprised when the first ship of Japanese immigrants arrived at Santos harbor in 1908 and they saw men and women in Western dress. Besides Western dresses, women wore hats and white cotton gloves. These European-styled clothes were bought with the immigrants’ own money in Japan and were made in Japanese factories. Traditionally, only male teachers in Japan’s rural areas wore European clothing (Handa 1987: 5–6). Brazilians were not accustomed to seeing well-dressed immigrants, as poor Southern European immigrants had arrived very dirty and tired. However, Brazilians saw Japanese, upon their arrival, as an odd people, who had a different phenotype, spoke another language, were not Catholics, and had different mores.
These feelings only began to change years later in the 1950s when many Japanese immigrants and their descendants began moving to cities and blending into Brazilian culture. They learned Portuguese, attended Brazilian schools, converted to Catholicism, and began marrying outside their ethnic group. Brazilians conceded that those whom they would always call Japanese were an intelligent, hardworking people.
Most Japanese immigrants settled first in São Paulo State, and then in Mato Grosso do Sul, Minas Gerais, Rio de Janeiro, and Paraná. A few others settled in the Amazon region, northeast region, and in the states of Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul.2
According to the environment where they settled, the Japanese colonization companies’ resources, and the kind of agreement with the Brazilian government, Japanese immigrants faced several challenges, some worse than others.
Japanese Immigrants’ Adjustment in Brazil
The social incorporation of Japanese immigrants and their descendants in Brazil was not easy. Brazilians called them Japonês/Japonesa (Japanese male and female) even if they were second or third generation. Gradually, things changed. Many became owners of small agricultural properties; others settled in cities. Most became members of the middle class and were respected as “intelligent” and “hard workers.” As Japan ascended as a world technological power, Brazilians looked upon the immigrants and their descendants with a newfound respect and admiration.
The immigrants’ intention was to stay for a few years in Brazil, work hard, save money, and then return to Japan. However, World War II interrupted their plans, and they had to settle in Brazil indefinitely. The novel Haru e Natsu e as Cartas que Não Chegaram (Haru and Natsu and the Letters that Did Not Arrive) compares the flawed relationships between family members who had left Japan and those who chose to stay (Hashida 2005). Some families maintained links and during World War II sent sugar and other foodstuff to their relatives in Japan, as told by an elderly immigrant referring to her father in Bastos. Some immigrants from Bastos were able to visit their families in Japan in the 1960s.
The Japanese government decided to promote emigration through Shakai Kyoku, a division of Naimusho (Department of Interior) in 1921. That division promoted the policy of emigration to Brazil, subsidizing KKKK, and establishing an Emigration Settlement in Kobe in order to help the emigrants in 1928. Through Shakai Kyoku, the government started paying the cost of the entire trip in 1924. In 1932, the Japanese government also began to help defray the costs incurred by immigrants while preparing to travel (Mita 1999: 42–43).
As a result of this Japanese policy, the number of Japanese immigrants reached 148,975 between 1926 and 1941, or 75 percent of the 180,000 immigrants that arrived between 1908 and 1942, when diplomatic relations between Brazil and Japan were interrupted. The spike in Japanese immigration to Brazil between 1928 and 1934 was particularly intense due to the closed-door policy that the United States implemented in 1924. During these seven years, 108,258 individuals arrived, representing 57.3 percent of all Japanese immigrants before World War II (Saito 1961: 34).
After 1934, the number of Japanese immigrants diminished in Brazil for a number of reasons. The 1934 Constitution created a quota system, which limited the number of arrivals in the country, among them Japanese immigrants. Immigration was further interrupted due to the diplomatic rupture between the two countries in 1942. In addition, when war between Japan and China began in 1937, the Japanese government passed the National General Mobilization Law as Japanese society prepared itself for further war. Emigration to Brazil ended in 1942 and began again only in 1953.
Japanese immigration to Brazil can be summarized in three periods according to Saito (1961):
The First Period of Japanese Immigration to Brazil, 1908–1925
Japanese immigration to Brazil started in 1908 with the arrival of 167 families containing 772 people to work on local coffee plantations. They replaced Italian immigration, which the Italian government had prohibited due to harsh working conditions on the plantations and the laborers not receiving their annual pay when the price of coffee fell sharply (Reichl 1985: 25–26). The Japanese immigration was subsidized by the São Paulo state government and by the coffee plantation owners.3 The São Paulo state government required that immigrants come as families not as individuals, demanding