Discovering South America: Brazil

(Opposite) In recent years, Brazil has been shaken by many public demonstrations, such as this march through São Paulo to protest gov- ernment corruption in November 2014. Other protests have focused on low wages or on high prices. (Right) Dilma Rousseff, the first female president of Brazil, was elected to a second term in 2014.

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A Legacy of Inequality

BRAZIL’S HISTORY CAN be divided into two major parts: the colonial era (1500 to 1821) and the post-independence period (1822 to the present). Colonial Brazil became the first great plantation society in the Americas. Using slave labor, its large agricultural estates produced sugar and, later, coffee. After Brazil broke away from Portugal in the 1820s, members of the Portuguese royal family ruled the South American country as emperors until 1889. Since 1889, Brazil has been a republic . For centuries, Brazil has been a land where Europeans, Amerindians (American Indians), and Africans intermingled, producing one of the most racially mixed societies in the world. But it is also a nation of deep and lasting social and economic gaps between its peoples.

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