Brazilian Civilization's Missing Link

Milton Ohata reviews Luiz Felipe de Alencastro’s O trato dos viventes: Forma o do Brasil no Atlantico Sul [Mortal Traffic: The Formation of Brazil in the South Atlantic]. O trato dos viventes begins from a simple but consequential premise: that in the history of Portuguese America, the whole is not the sum of its parts; that is, it cannot be understood by merely combining the histories of its various regimes. Rather, local history is to be interpreted in the light of its effective connections, in reciprocal determination, with the history of capitalism — in which the slave trade played an indispensible part.