Black Beans, White Rice: On the Racialization of Table Manners in Brazil, 1805–2018

Abstract

Following the implosion of the “racial democracy” myth, scholars have debated the role of cultural imperialism apparent in the shift toward dichotomous “black-white” expressions of race in Brazil. This contribution situates quotidian expressions of cultural imperialism at the heart of racialization projects. Building from research on “blackness” as a transnational historical phenomenon, this article examines how one particular expression of cultural “whiteness” came to social life in Brazil. The account draws on ethnographic research in southern Bahia and 19th century travel writing to trace how a particular manner of eating beans and rice, which some rural Bahians today describe as “eating by hand” (comendo de mão), transitioned from being an unmarked and widespread commensal practice in the 19th century—even among Brazil’s social elites—to become a stigma-tized and racialized practice, as expressed in contemporary race ideologies. While the use of utensils became a sign of whiteness, eating by hand was reconstituted as a mark of non-whiteness.