Crânios e cachaça: coleções ameríndias e exposições no século XIX

Abstract

This article examines the form in which indigenous peoples were placed on display in regional and universal expositions in the Brazilian Empire, Europe, and the United States. Focusing on archaelogical and ethnographic collections assembled by different museums, the author shows that these practices were linked to the official "Cathecism and Civilization" program and to the mission villages (aldeamentos) of the Brazilian Empire, which became the main source of the collections displayed during the reign of Pedro II. Controlled by Italian Capucin monks, the mission villages also afford a glimpse at the ways in which Kaiowá, Kaingang, Krahó, Xerente, and Sateré-Mawé Indians approached the public sphere at both the provincial and Imperial levels, bearing messages that alluded to new subjectivities and to new forms of inclusion, in response to government policies promoting the spatial rearrangement of indigenous populations as well as stimulating both internal migrations and European immigration.