Deeper than Skin: Browns’ and Blacks’ Perceptions of Discrimination in Brazil

ABSTRACT

A significant number of Brazilian academics tend to group black and brown people as a single category in studies on race relations due to their similar socioeconomic indicators. Recent research into identity profiles and perceptions of discrimination do not however suggest the same convergence between the two groups. The following article contributes to the debate on discrimination experienced by black, mixed race, and white people based on data furnished by the Social Dimensions of Inequality Survey. Our results suggest that race cannot be analyzed in Brazil without taking socioeconomic circumstances into account. Our unprecedented approach shows that in terms of perceptions of discrimination, mixed-race people of a low socioeconomic status are closely aligned with black people in the same socioeconomic circumstances, while brown people with a higher status report much less discrimination, on more of a par with white people.

classification by color; race discrimination; perceptions of discrimination