Socio-Legal Discussion Group: Phenotype, scientific racism, and colonialism: the reintroduction of colonial categories of race in committee proceedings within Brazil

My research focuses on the creation of racial quotas in Brazil, I seek to explore how legal concepts of race compare with social understandings of race. I aim to do this by looking at the experiences of applicants applying for university places through racial quotas, adjudicators in their role and policymakers’ perceptions. By investigating racial quotas my research seeks to interrogate the site of historical memory about the Trans-Atlantic slave trade in Brazil. What is the overarching legacy of slavery as a historical crime for the nation? How and why did the university become a tool for social change among activists advocating for racial quotas? In addition, my research seeks to understand how racial quotas were created as a step to overcome the legacy of slavery, racial discrimination and stigma in Brazil for the Black and Brown communities.  

In this, it aims to explore how racial quotas have been implemented in the university setting to overcome the lack of Black and Brown presence on campus. Moreover, my research explores how lei de cotas a (bottom-up) law was created, and how the grassroots origins of this law have influenced its outcomes as it was adopted and implemented by federal and state legislators. Through research on racial quotas, it seeks to explore how the memory of slavery has been confronted through the legislative process of racial quotas. By looking into what types of Black and Brown Brazilians acquire quotas, this research seeks to explore the current manifestations of racial stigma, and how colour and phenotype have played a role in the types of life opportunities Black and Brown citizens acquire. Through this vein, my work seeks to explore the themes of substantive equality and reparatory justice in equality legislations such as affirmative action.’