Introduction

Brazil is a country located in the center of the South American continent, and its official name is the Federal Republic of Brazil. Portugal is the only South American country to use Portuguese as its official language and has the largest territory in South America. It borders all South American countries except Chile and Ecuador, and is the fifth largest in area in the world. Brazil is the sixth most populous country in the world, with a population of over 210 million as of 2022. The capital is Brasilia, and the largest city in Brazil is Sao Paulo.

Brazil is a federal country consisting of 26 states (estado) and one federal district (distrito federal).

 

 

Characteristics of Brazilian people

 

1) Population composition and ethnicity

Brazil’s population is 211,049,527 as of 2019, making it the largest in Latin America and the 6th most populous in the world. Brazil is a representative multi-ethnic and multi-racial country. As of 2017, Brazil’s white population is 44.2% of the total, lower than the mulatto population of 46.7%, blacks are 8.2%, and Asians and indigenous people make up the rest. One characteristic of Brazilian racial classification is that, while in the United States, races are classified based on ancestry, in Brazil they are based on personal subjective factors such as skin color. Therefore, even if you are mixed race, if your skin color is light, you are considered white.

Brazil’s ethnic characteristics are as diverse as its vast territory. The southern region of Brazil is mainly inhabited by descendants of European immigrants, and there is a high proportion of white people of German, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and French descent. On the other hand, the northeastern region is home to a majority of African descendants who came through the slave trade during the Portuguese colonial period. In the case of Asians, most are descendants of immigrants from Japan, while others include Chinese and Korean. There are also many people of Lebanese and Syrian descent who immigrated from the Middle East and Southwest Asia, and they are mainly classified as white based on their skin color.

When discussing race and ethnicity in Brazil, the most important factor is mixing. Since Brazil was discovered by the Portuguese Pedro Alvares Cabral on April 22, 1500, Indians, Europeans, Africans, and Asians have been mixed in a crucible of races. As the Portuguese began to colonize Brazil, they took indigenous wives and created a new race called the caboclo, which later gave birth to a mixed race called the mulatto between white Portuguese and African women. Mulatoes currently make up the majority of mixed-race people in Brazil, and their numbers are gradually increasing, currently maintaining the majority in Brazil’s ethnic composition.

2) language

Brazil’s official language is Portuguese, and it is the only Portuguese-speaking country in South America due to past colonial rule by Portugal. Portuguese is one of the world’s six largest languages by number of speakers and is used as an official and working language in international organizations such as the European Union (EU), Mercosul, the Organization of American States (OAS), the African Union (AU), and the Community of Portuguese-speaking Countries (CPLP). there is. Highly educated Brazilians can speak English and French, but the average Brazilian speaks only Portuguese. The grammar system and vocabulary are very similar to those of Spain, so most people can generally understand Spanish.

Like other languages, Portuguese has gone through a historical evolution process influenced by other languages and dialects. The Portuguese currently used in Brazil is Brazilian Portuguese, which has some differences from European Portuguese in terms of phoneme and vocabulary. This is because Brazilian Portuguese is influenced by Tupi, an indigenous language, African languages brought to Brazil through the African slave trade, and the languages spoken by numerous immigrants from various European countries, resulting in the creation of Brazilian Portuguese, which is distinct from European Portuguese. .

Today, the Tupi influence remains in Brazilian Portuguese, and approximately 10,000 Tupi words remain in Portuguese. For example, Iguaçu, famous as one of the world’s three largest waterfalls, is also Tupi. Also, the influence of African languages on Portuguese cannot be overlooked. Among African languages, Quimbundo was the language most commonly spoken by African slaves, and as a result, it had a great influence on Portuguese vocabulary in everyday life, including religious ceremonies, food names, and musical instrument names. Samba, which represents Brazil, is also an African language.

3) Religion

Religion in Brazil consists of Roman Catholicism (55%), Protestantism (27%), and others (18%) as of 2017. In Brazil, Catholicism has penetrated deeply into various parts of Brazil’s society and culture through the edification and devotion of the Jesuits who came to Brazil in the early days of Portuguese colonization. However, in recent years, Catholic power has been greatly threatened by the spread of Protestant religions such as Evangelicalism, Christian Congregation, and Pentecostalism, as well as the influence of black African religions and indigenous beliefs. There are also Brazilian unique African religions, such as Umbanda and Candomblé, which emerged by hybridizing indigenous traditions and black religious elements with Catholicism.

The weakening status of Catholicism in Brazil today is due to the structure of social inequality. Brazilian people suffering from poverty and suffering tend to be absorbed not only in liberation theology but also in African religions that have the power to comfort people. Nevertheless, Catholicism, which has dominated Brazilian society, culture, and politics as the main religion since the 16th century, is still the most influential religion in Brazilian society.

 

society

1) Education

The first educational institution established in Brazil was the Jesuit School during the Portuguese colonial period. Jesuit missionaries taught history, philosophy, and theology based on a strict education system. The main purposes of Jesuit schools at the time were Catholic missions, training clergy, and training leaders for colonial rule.

Educational reform was accomplished in 1934, when Getúlio Vargas’s revised constitution specified the state’s obligation to eradicate illiteracy and provide primary education. The current education system guarantees free elementary education to all citizens. This is specified in the ‘Lei de Diretrizes e Bases da Educacao Nacional’, approved in December 1996. According to this law, Brazil’s education system is divided into basic education and university education. Basic education is divided into three stages: early childhood education for preschool children, elementary education, which is equivalent to elementary and middle school schools in Korea, and secondary education, which is equivalent to high school in Korea. University education consists of undergraduate and graduate courses.

In addition, there are technical education courses administered by each state and city for technical education and vocational training, and there are also special education courses in charge of education for the disabled. Brazil is making national efforts to develop education policy by announcing the ‘National Plan on Education (Plano Nacional da Educacao)’ in 2001. In particular, it focuses on measures such as reducing illiteracy, expanding special education, and extending the compulsory education period to 9 years.

 

2) Social Security System

President Collor implemented policies that focused on the privatization of public welfare obligations and the realization of a minimal state, contrary to the guarantee of social rights and universalization of social rights by the state advocated in the revised Federal Constitution in 1988. The Social Assistance Law was enacted in 1993, guaranteeing a certain level of livelihood to the poor through a continuous cash payment system. This neoliberal policy stance gained further strength during the term of Fernando Henrique Cardoso from 1995 to 2002. It returned to privatization of public assets, denial of social assistance policy, and reduction of social policy finance based on the Washington Consensus.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who took office in 2003, attempted to achieve social integration by promoting the spending power of the poor through the income transfer system while maintaining the neoliberal policy stance that had already dominated the Latin American region. In particular, President Lula established social security policies to resolve extreme hunger and poverty through the ‘Bolsa Familia Transfer Program’ and the ‘Fome Zero’ policy.

In President Lula’s second term (2007-2010), social security policies were further expanded based on Brazil’s economic growth. In particular, the beneficiaries of the ‘Bolsa Familia Transfer Program’ were expanded so that more than 12 million low-income households could benefit. As a result, during President Lula’s term, approximately 28 million people escaped poverty, 36 million people were newly incorporated into the middle class, and the rate of absolute poverty decreased to 8.5%.

Dilma Rousseff, who took office as President of Brazil following Lula in 2011, presented ‘building a rich country without poverty’ as a slogan in her first public speech, and put poverty eradication as the top national task. However, the Temer government, which emerged after President Rousseff’s impeachment in 2016, promoted social security reform to reduce the fiscal deficit.

Brazil currently has a significant number of people suffering from hunger. As of 2021, 33.1 million people, equivalent to 15.5% of the Brazilian population, are suffering from hunger, which is due to increased social inequality due to the worsening economic crisis that has continued since 2014 and the COVID-19 pandemic since 2020.

 

Conclusion

It is a country in central South America. It is the only country in Latin America that developed from a Portuguese colony, becoming independent as a kingdom under the Portuguese royal family in 1822, abolishing slavery in 1888, and becoming a republic. It is the only Portuguese-speaking country in Latin America and is a multiethnic and multicultural country.