Everyday Transnationalism: Religion in the Lives of Brazilian Migrants in London and Brazil

Abstract

While migration from Brazil to London is by no means insignificant, London’s Brazilian community remains largely invisible within existing migration research and within the public consciousness. Such invisibility has been put down to various factors including the recentness of the flow, the tendency for migration research in the UK to focus on communities with direct colonial or historical links to Britain, the fact that many Brazilian migrants are undocumented and so choose to keep a low profile (Evans et al. 2007), and finally, the fact that, compared with many other migrant groups, there exist few examples of institutional or informal support networks to mobilize or unite the community. Yet there is little doubt that London’s Brazilian community has grown rapidly in recent years, evident through the emergence of a growing number of Brazilian shops, restaurants, and, perhaps most significantly, a diverse range of religious institutions. This chapter explores the role of religion in the lives and imaginations of Brazilian migrants in London, their families “back home” in Brazil, and, furthermore, how it enables them to create and maintain links between the two. Conceptually, the relationship between religion and migrant transnationalism is one that has, until recently, been largely overlooked within academic research.