https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9183-3400
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Abstract
After the ‘Grande Seca’ of 1877, the deadliest famine recorded in Brazil, the government installed so-called concentration camps to prevent famine migrants from the dry Northeastern backlands from reaching Fortaleza, capital of the Ceará state in 1915 and 1932. Officially, the camps were depicted as relief centres, but their inhumane conditions earned them the nickname of ‘death camps’. After their closure, the camps and their famine victims fell into oblivion. Recently, however, both government and civil society actors have taken initiatives to commemorate them. In 2019, the Patu Concentration Camp (the only one for which physical remains can still be found) and the Walk of the Drought (a religious pilgrimage) were officially recognised as heritage sites. This article introduces the research by emphasising how famines are rarely publicly commemorated and describes investigation initiatives that contribute to breaking the silence around famine victims in Brazil. To conclude, the article refers to background literature, document analysis and interviews to discuss the efforts that have been put into public memorialisation so far, as a means to overcome the marginalisation of the memories of peasants from the Northeastern backlands.
Acknowledgments
I thank João Carlos Barbosa for research assistance. I am grateful for the opportunity to discuss the ideas of the article in the seminar organised by Camilla Orjuela and Swati Parashar, as well as for the rich exchange of ideas with them. I thank Geraldo Laprovitera Teixeira, Maria Paula Adinofi, Ítala Byanca Morais da Silva, and Cosmo da Silva Júnior for helping me access official documents. I also thank Valdeci Alves, Fram Paulo and Geraldo Teixeira for their interviews.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
2 While ‘containment camp’ might be a more appropriate term for these camps (see Nelson and Finan Citation2009), I will adopt the official term ‘concentration camp’, which is also used in the Brazilian academic debate.
3 The research adheres to the ethnical norms and guidelines of my institution, including regarding informed consent of the interviewees.
4 Throughout the article, translations of texts in Portuguese into English are done by the author, unless otherwise stated.
5 The first camp was established some 25 years before the Nazi camps. Although the Brazilian concentration camps did not resort to Nazi extermination tactics, they were built on a similar logic of dehumanisation and desire to govern bodies.
6 Literally Vulture and Slaughterhouse.
9 Virtual interview with Fram Paulo, November 29, 2021. Paulo is a member of the Walk’s organising committee and one of the first activists to promote the official memorialisation of the Patu Camp.
10 Ceará state’s Ordinary Law no. 17.689 of September 28, 2021. Available at: https://leisestaduais.com.br/ce/lei-ordinaria-n-17698-2021-ceara-inclui-a-caminhada-da-seca-no-roteiro-turistico-do-estado-do-ceara-por-sua-destacada-relevancia-cultural-turistica-e-religiosa
11 Interview with Alves, October 27, 2021.
12 Interview with Fram Paulo, November 29, 2021.
14 Interview with Fram Paulo, November 29, 2021.
15 Available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTSDnb6T7cc
16 Interview, November 29, 2021.
18 The following timeline builds on the excellent research of Martins (Citation2015) and my own primary documentation of administrative and judiciary processes. Some institutional actions of the Team have been omitted for reasons of space. Other agents also acted through these means, but they have been omitted because they did not advance as far as the Team 19-22 processes. For example, in 2001, a group of professors and students of History of the State University of Ceará started a judicial process against the government, demanding the protection of the Patu site.
19 Interview with Fram Paulo, November 29, 2021. Also, there is a mention of a memo filed by the Team 19-22 on June 3, 1996, petitioning fundamentally the same thing. Source: Coordenação de Patrimônio Histórico e Cultural, Secretaria Estadual de Cultura do Ceará. Parecer Técnico: Tombamento Estadual. Imóvel: Vila dos Ingleses. Processo no. 2854220/2010. Fortaleza, June 14, 2017.
20 This Popular Action is fully available in the Federal Justice Process no. 99.008929-4, through which the city was ordered in 2011 to provide heritage protection.
21 The DNOCS is the new name for the Federal Inspectorate of Works Against Droughts, which was headed by the earlier discussed author José Américo de Almeida in 1932.
22 Federal Justice Process no. 99.008929-4.
23 Interview with Geraldo Teixeira, November 29, 2021.
24 Informação Técnica 0124/14 – DITEC/IPHAN-CE.
26 Interview with Geraldo Teixeira, November 29, 2021; and Interview with Alves, October 27, 2021.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Thiago Lima
Thiago Lima has a Master’s degree in International Relations and a PhD in Political Science. He won the CAPES National Award for Best PhD Thesis in Political Science in 2015. His thesis was published with the title O protecionismo agrícola nos Estados Unidos (Agricultural protectionism in the United States, free translation) by Editora Unesp (2018). He has been publishing in the field of hunger, food and international relations in recent years, and edited (with Agostina Costantino) the book Food Security and International Relations: Critical Perspectives from the Global South (Ibidem-Verlag, 2021). A previous version of this article received an Honorable Mention by ANPOCS’ Lia Zanotta Machado Award in Human Rights in 2022. He is Associate Professor in the Department of International Relations at Federal University of Paraíba (UFPB, Brazil) and coordinates the Research Group on Hunger and International Relations (fomeri.org).