Brazil Demographics

Brazil is currently the fifth-most populated nation in the world, with over 170 million inhabitants. The Southeast has historically been—and remains—the most populated area, containing just over half the nation’s entire population.

It is estimated that when the first Portuguese settlers arrived in what would become Brazil in the year 1500, there were more than 1000 denominations of indigenous peoples, having a total population between two and four million. Largely due to enslavement and the spread of European diseases such as measles, this number has now dwindled to approximately 350,000 individuals who comprise 217 discrete peoples and speak over 180 different languages. For the most part, this population is distributed among the 595 Terras Indígenas (indigenous reservations) spread throughout the national territory, though most are found in the Amazon Basin. As in North America, the indigenous peoples of Brazil are often referred to as “Indians,” due to the first Europeans’ mistaken belief that they had, upon arriving in Brazil, reached India.

While not as impressive as the diversity of the indigenous peoples, the ethnic background of the 55% of Brazilians who are of Caucasian descent is also far from homogenous. The earliest and largest group of European settlers was Portuguese, reflected in the fact that Portuguese is the official language. There are also many Brazilians of Spanish, Italian, and German descent; during the 1920s, the number of Italians in São Paulo was so great that it was commonly referred to as the “City of Italians.” In Santa Catarina, German roots are still celebrated in part by Blumenau’s three-week-long Oktoberfest. In addition to these larger ethnic groups, there are also Brazilians of Polish, Russian, Dutch, and Japanese ancestry. Today the Liberdade district of São Paulo is the largest community of Japanese descent outside of Japan.

Like their counterparts in North America, the European settlers of Brazil imported African slaves to work on plantations, a practice which was legally sanctioned until 1888. Largely as a result of this, an approximate 40% of Brazilians are at least partially of African descent (mostly of Yoruba and Quimbundu origin, from areas that roughly correspond to modern-day Nigeria/Benin and Angola).

In recent years, a sense of general “Brazilian” national identity has been fostered by the nation’s international success in arenas such as soccer’s World Cup. However, the concept of a “racial democracy” in Brazil is an ideal that has not fully been reached; citizens of African and indigenous descent still face discrimination. The development of a sense of national identity—a process referred to as brasilidade—was first declared a national objective by President Getúlio Vargas. His decision to construct the new, centralized capital of Brasília was seen as an important conceptual step toward uniting the country as one nation rather than an agglomeration of large city-states. But while brasilidade does encourage an admirable ideal of unity, it has not at all abolished the stark economic contrasts which lie along class and racial divisions.