Blacks of the Land

Professors Barbara Weinstein and James Woodard have translated John M. Monteiro's field-defining work from its original Portuguese into English. The book engages with themes central to slavery studies and ethnohistory and makes clear the degree to which native peoples shaped the colonial history of southeastern Brazil.

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Originally published in Portuguese in 1994 as Negros da Terra, this field-defining work by the late historian John M. Monteiro has been translated into English by Professors Barbara Weinstein and James Woodard. Monteiro's work established ethnohistory as a field in colonial Brazilian studies and made indigenous history a vital part of how scholars understand Brazil's colonial past. Drawing on over two dozen collections on both sides of the Atlantic, Monteiro rescued Indians from invisibility, documenting their role as both objects and actors in Brazil's colonial past and, most importantly, providing the first history of Indian slavery in Brazil. Monteiro demonstrates how Indian enslavement, not exploration or the search for mineral wealth, was the driving force behind expansion out of São Paulo and through the South American backcountry. This book makes a groundbreaking contribution not only to Latin American history, but to the history of indigenous slavery in the Americas generally.