Brasileiros orientais (Portuguese) | |
|---|---|
| Total population | |
East Asian ancestry predominates 850,130 (2022 census) 0.42% of Brazilian population[nt 1][1][2] | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Mainly inSão Paulo,Paraná andPará | |
| Languages | |
| Portuguese Other languages of Asia, includingArabic,Chinese dialects andJapanese | |
| Religion | |
| Majority Christian:[3] 61.2%Roman Catholicism, 13.3%Protestantism, 12.5%Non-religious, 0.8% other Christian beliefs[4] Minority:Buddhism,Judaism,Shinto and Shinto-derivedJapanese new religions,Taoism,Hinduism,Islam,Sikhism,Jainism,Zoroastrianism andDruze[5] |
Asian Brazilians (Portuguese:Brasileiros asiáticos) refers to Brazilian citizens or residents of Asian ancestry. The vast majority trace their origins toWestern Asia, particularlyLebanon,[6] orEast Asia, namelyJapan. The Brazilian census does not use "Asian" as a racial category, though the term "yellow" (amarela in Portuguese) refers to people of East Asian ethnic origin.
Beyond the descendants from West Asia and East Asia, there has also been much smaller immigration fromSoutheast Asia andSouth Asia, as well as those from the Asian diaspora in the Caribbean and Mozambique.
Brazil has the largest community ofJapanese descendants outside ofJapan. Japanese immigrants started to move to Brazil in 1908, were directed to the Brazilian coffee plantations.[7]
Recent research has suggested that Asians from the earlyPortuguese Eastern Empire, known asLuso-Asians first came to Brazil during the sixteenth century as seamen known asLascars, or as servants, slaves andconcubines accompanying the governors, merchants and clergy who has served in Portuguese Asia.[8]
The first substantial Asian immigration to Brazil were a small number ofChinese people (3,000) during the colonial period ascoolie slaves. Later waves of Chinese immigrants would come from Hong Kong andMacau, the latter being a former Portuguese colony,[9] as well as China'sethnic Russian community during the 1950s.[10]
| East Asian Brazilians 1940-2022 | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Population | % of Brazil | |||||
| 1940 | 242,320 |  0.59% | |||||
| 1950 | 329,082 |  0.63% | |||||
| 1960 | 482,848 | 0.69% | |||||
| 1980 | 672,251 | 0.56% | |||||
| 1991 | 630,656 | 0.43% | |||||
| 2000 | 761,583 | 0.45% | |||||
| 2010 | 2,084,288 | 1.09% | |||||
| 2022 | 850,130 | 0.42% | |||||
| Source: Brazilian census[11] | |||||||
Later, significant immigration from Asia to Brazil would start in the late 19th century, when immigration fromLebanon andSyria became important. Until 1922,Levantine immigrants were considered "Turks", as they carried passports issued by the TurkishOttoman Empire, which then ruled over present-dayLebanon.[12] Various estimates for Lebanese ancestry in Brazil place them at about 7 million.[13][14]
Another important Asian immigrant group to Brazil were fromJapan. The firstJapanese immigrants arrived in Brazil in 1908. Until the 1950s, more than 250 thousand Japanese immigrated to Brazil. Currently, theJapanese-Brazilian population is estimated at 2.1 million people. It is the largestethnic Japanese population outside Japan, followed closely by theJapanese community in the United States.
Other East Asian groups are also significant in Brazil. TheKorean Brazilian population is estimated to be 50,000, and theChinese Brazilian population around 250,000. Over 70% of Asian Brazilians are concentrated in the state ofSão Paulo. There are significant populations inParaná,Pará,Mato Grosso do Sul, and other parts of Brazil.
| Ethnic group | Period | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1904-1913 | 1914-1923 | 1924-1933 | 1945-1949 | 1950-1954 | 1955-1959 | |||||
| Japanese | 11,868 | 20,398 | 110,191 | 12 | 5,447 | 28,819 | ||||
Although discussions were situated in a theoretical field, immigrants arrived and colonies were founded through all this period (the rule ofPedro II), especially from 1850 on, particularly in theSoutheast andSouthern Brazil. These discussions culminated in the Decree 528 in 1890, signed by Brazil's first PresidentDeodoro da Fonseca, which opened the national harbors to immigration except for Africans and Asians.[16] This decree remained valid until 5 October 1892 when, due to pressures of coffee planters interested in cheap manpower, it was overturned by Law 97, which allowed the entry ofJapanese immigrants to work on the coffee plantations, as until then, Brazilian immigration was almost exclusively from Europe.[17]
descendentes e os asiáticos – japoneses, chineses, coreanos, libaneses, sírios, entre outros
and the third one is the resettlement of the Russians from China during the 1950s.
| By origin in Asia  |
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