Gilberto Fernandes. This Pilgrim Nation: The Making of the Portuguese Diaspora in Postwar North America

Abstract

Gilberto Fernandes’s comprehensive longitudinal history contemplates the “social, cultural, religious, economic and political processes involved in the making of Diaspora in the largest and most concentrated Portuguese communities in North America,” and contributes new research examining “the role of the Estado Novo and its opponents in shaping these communities’ cultural identities, institutional structures, ruling elites, and political relations, and how they set the foundations for the post-imperial reconfiguration of Portuguese ‘nationhood’” (5). Fernandes analyzes global interconnections between the colonial regime, the church, US political interests, and transnational political movements to consider the less examined variables swaying local cultural practices and civic participation. How cultural diplomacy and elite activities influenced symbols and rituals in attempts to shape a transnational diasporic consciousness provides a central research contribution of This Pilgrim Nation: The Making of the Portuguese Diaspora in Postwar North America, as does its depiction of nuanced immigrant responses to António de Oliveira Salazar and his colonial regime.