"YOU CAN'T CATCH FLIES WITH VINEGAR": Rural Workers, Migration, Race Relations and the Economy in Barra Mansa - RJ (1888-1920)

Abstract

This article aims to discuss the articulation among the post-abolition agrarian elites, economic changes, and the migration process among workers in Barra Mansa, Rio de Janeiro State. It also explores the meanings of race, class, and ruralism in the South of Rio de Janeiro in general and in this city in particular. It utilizes data from censuses and periodicals from 1888 to the early 1920s, as well as interviews with descendants of local slaves, in order to demonstrate the antagonisms between settlers and rural magnates, as well as how migration constituted a form of resistance on the part of black rural families in Barra Mansa.