Gilberto Freyre’s lusotropicalism as baroque critique of the mixophobia of bourgeois modernity

Abstract

This article aims to create a new framework for debate on the old and new controversies of lusotropicalism, emphasizing the medieval and renaissance inheritances of Gilberto Freyre’s speech, in contrast to the exceptionalism of the colonialism of the Berlin Conference. From an anthropo-historical perspective, the author of this article makes parallels with the controversies of Spanish colonization and blood cleansing, as well as reviews the precedents, rectifications and actualities of the Luso and Hispanotropicalist discourse. The author argues that it is a mistake assuming Freyre’s lusotropicalism as a Portuguese neo-nationalism, although this existed as the production of the Salazarist State itself. This article is part of a research about the connection of the life and work of Gilberto Freyre with Spain and the Iberian Peninsula in general.