Fronteiras e relações interétnicas: análise etno-histórica das populações indígenas e negras do Cabo Norte

Abstract

In the Amazon, the interethnic relationship between indigenous, black and white groups, since the colonial era, was marked by conflicts that placed the first two on the margin of submission, becoming social minorities in the face of the dominant society. This paper aims to analyze the interethnic relations among the above mentioned groups after the construction of the São José de Macapá Fortification (1764-1782), in the period between the end of the 18th century and the first half of the 19th century, in the region until then known as the Northern Cape (Amapá). The study was based on the transcription and analysis of documents - letters - found in the Public Archive of Pará, catalogued in the series Correspondence of Others with the Government and literature on Ethnicity. Barth (1998, 2000), Cardoso de Oliveira (1976, 1981) and Carneiro da Cunha (1987) were consulted. In the course of the research, it was verified that due to the miscegenation process, mestizos also composed the Amazonian space, leading part of them - alongside Indians and Blacks - to combine political and social interests. Together they undertook escapes, thus boosting the emergence of mocambos in the area. At the beginning of the 1800s, recruited as soldiers, they took part in the invasion of Cayenne (1809-1817), but at the end they were ignored and began to represent a danger of subversion to society. In the following years, precisely during the Cabanagem (1835-1840), allocated in the category "cabanos", they demanded changes in the social structure, suffering both physical repression through assassinations and imprisonment, and social repression through the Labor Corps (1838-1859), a policy that intended to fit them into the governmental "order" of Grão-Pará. The data analyzed allow us to see that the relationship established among the ethnic groups was characterized by the subjection and exclusion of a significant portion of the population to the socio-political order forged by a small dominant portion.