Xeno-racism or racialized xenophobia? Problematizing selective hospitality to foreigners in Brazil

Abstract

In this study, we introduce the concept of xeno-racism, proposed by the Srilankan novelist Ambalavaner Sivanandan, discussing its possible applications to studies on migration, diaspora and xenophobia in Brazil. We problematize the relationship between xenophobia and racism in view of the particular historical and social characteristics of capitalism in Brazil. We argue that the criteria of acceptance and distinction in societies based on colonization offered a scenario of unequal distribution of reception to foreigners, depending on their origin and heteroclassification in the social markers of local difference. This selectivity, here named as racialized xenophobia, imposes sociological characteristics specific to migratory dynamics in the particular Brazilian context.