Center for the Humanities and the Public Sphere

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Licinio Nunes de Miranda (Ph.D. Candidate, History) – “Land of Light: Slavery, Freedpeople and Abolitionism in Brazil, 1880-1888”

The province of Ceará was the first to abolish slavery in Brazil (1884), four years before the abolition occurred nationwide (1888). It was also there that the first popular victory against slavery occurred, with the shutdown of the slave trade in 1881. This dissertation addresses the extent of the involvement of non-white people, along with the organization of former slaves in a political group and the means that slaves employed to earn their freedom. By using neglected sources, including personal correspondences, church and notarial records, this dissertation argues that people of color were essential to the success of the movement.

Georgios Topalidis (Ph.D. Candidate, Sociology and Criminology & Law) – “The Whitening Process Model: Forging an Anti-Racist Praxis for Descendants of Ottoman Greek Immigrants in the United States”

Racialization experiences of Ottoman Greek immigrants who arrived in the United States in the early 20th century will test the Whitening Process model, which contributes to scholarship about the social construction of racial identity. The model borrows from racial formation and social memory theories to show how the racialization of Ottoman Greek immigrants was constructed, remembered, and forgotten. A mixed-method approach comprised of statistical analysis of a data set from a ship-manifest archive, and interviews with descendants of Ottoman Greek immigrants will demonstrate that racial identity contestation results in an existential crisis for targeted individuals or groups.