Refuge in Brazil: An Ethnographic Approach

Abstract

Recent years have witnessed an exponential growth in the number of refugees received in Brazil, most of whom have settled in São Paulo, one of its major cities. The data presented here were collected as part of a broader ethnographic research on mental health services for immigrants and refugees conducted between 2017 and 2019 in the city of São Paulo. This study is intended to describe refugees’ experiences in the city, presenting two major conclusions: the first advocates that to better understand the context of refuge, we need to promote fractures in the category’s monolithic block; we need to abandon the rigidity prescribed by its legal definition, and instead consider it a dynamic and constantly moving structure. The second argument postulates that we should also abandon the idea of a remissive configuration of the category of refuge, paying special attention to the fact that the confinement of refugees to a temporality in the past can obfuscate our understanding of what they are attempting to communicate. Herein lies the originality of what is presented: the results of the research reveal that a refuge is a relational category, produced not only by State bureaucracies and international organizations, but also by its own subjects. Refugees in Brazil refuse to be limited by the bureaucratic categories, and they reformulate its boundaries so new internal and external divisions can be made. These include refúgio branco and refúgio negro. They also encompass other members otherwise excluded by the bureaucratic category of refuge.