Brazilians in Santiago de Chile: the production of interstitial identities from biographical and intersectional perspectives

• In Event: Brazilian emigration: what we know and what is new about it -2

Abstract

International immigration in Chile has grown quickly in the last 10 years. Current migrants coming from South America and the Caribbean, mostly female, non-white and composed by low-skilled workers, which makes this a problem of gender, race and class, intersectionally. This article presents the first results of a doctoral research that attempts to analyze, from biographical and intersectional perspectives, how Brazilian immigrants in Santiago de Chile produce and negotiate identities into interstitial spaces between two cultural frames (Brazilian and Chilean). Furthermore, it discusses how the social position of the subject – in terms of gender, race and class, simultaneously – is important in this process. A narrative methodology (Life Story Method and Participative Photography) was used in the construction of a deep understanding about their identity processes and their differences according to the social position of each subject. About 20 Brazilian participants has been invited to tell their migration stories and take pictures of their daily life for one week. The first contact with the narrative material produced suggested that the experience of negotiating and producing identities between cultures may vary according to the position that the subject is into the networks of social relations. These results can offer additional knowledge about the dynamics of identity production into the migration process because it considers power relations in that. Moreover, it displays a profound understanding on the subjective experience of international migration between South American countries, while highlighting the cultural plurality of this continent.

Authors

• Ariany Da Silva Villar, Pontifícia Universidad Católica de Chile

• Dariela Sharim, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile