Strategies of small farmers of color to meet the challenge of expanding slave-based sugar plantations: Campinas, 1779-1836

• Grant number: 15/22295-8
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Doctorate
• Start date: February 28, 2016
• End date: August 27, 2016
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - History - History of Brazil
• Principal Investigator: Robert Wayne Andrew Slenes
• Grantee: Laura Candian Fraccaro
• Supervisor: Henrice Altink
• Host Institution: Instituto de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas (IFCH). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: University of York, England
• Associated to the scholarship: 14/01016-0 - Strategies of small farmers of color to meet the challenge of expanding slave-based sugar plantations: Campinas, 1779-1836, BP.DR

Abstract

This Doctoral Exchange Application for the University of York is part of the research for my doctoral dissertation. As a Ph.D. student, I research how small agriculturalists, producing mostly for the internal marked, managed to maintain their production in an expanding frontier despite the advance of sugar plantations over food crops. The place chosen for the study is the township of Campinas, because of the rapid growth of its population and of its sugar production after its foundation in 1774. Campinas offers numerous historical sources, for instance, nearly annual local census recordings for the period of 1779-1836, wills, probate documents and trials records regarding conflicts over landholding. All these records lend themselves to the analysis of the changes in the production, household composition, slave ownership and wealth concentration of sugar planters. The present project outlines my candidacy for the Doctoral Exchange at the University of York under the supervision of Professor Henrice Altink. The objectives of this exchange period are to widen the discussion about local history, its sources and its methodology using a social history approach and to participate in discussions about labour and the freed population from an international perspective. In order to fulfil these objectives, I will audit some courses in addition to attending discussions and lectures offered by the Department of History. The period as a visiting research scholar at York will take place from January to July, including two terms, spring and summer. Until the beginning of the Doctoral Exchange, I will finish reading all the sources and records. If reviewing or looking into a historical source proves necessary, I will be able to do so abroad. Although I will be at the University of York, I will be able to access all my sources due to their availability online and my possession of copies of those documents that are not digitalized.