UM TESOURO ETÍLICO: BEBIDAS, IDENTIDADES E CATEGORIAS SOCIAIS NA AMAZÔNIA PORTUGUESA DO SÉCULO XVIII

Abstract

The internalization of the Portuguese colonization of Brazil was marked, as occurred in other colonial contexts, by the construction of a kind of discourse that I will call colonial discourse, which is characterized by the separation between colonizers and colonized from a series of distinctions and oppositions that revolve around the dichotomy civilized / barbarian. A privileged field in the construction of colonial discourse is the food and alcoholic habits, which organize the social categories and define individuals and groups belonging to those categories. In the case of the Portuguese Amazon in eighteenth century we have some extremely rich reports and descriptions about the alcoholic customs of indigenous peoples and the poor population, which we allow for a privileged look on the construction of colonial discourse.