Colonial labor demand shaped racial typing of African ethnic groups

Evidence

For a long time the Portuguese morador or “settler” in Brazil had himself assumed that all slaves from Africa were “Angolas” or “Bantus” and since Brazilian agriculture was developed by the “Bantu” farmer his reputation continued to hold even long after it became apparent that “all Africans” were not “alike.” For the “Angolas,” sought at the engenhos (sugar mill and plantation complexes in the immediate hinterland of Bahia called Reconcavo), a composite belief in their “docility” and willingness to assimilate and in their greater “mechanical inclination” was grafted onto the earlier reputation of agricultural excellence. The “Minas” on the other hand encountered an entirely different demand: regarded as more enterprising and intelligent than “Angolas” and as poor plantation hands at the same time, they were valued as household slaves and in the trades and skills. — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 759

Categorization

• XREF: Recalls how the author elsewhere shows racial ideology following economic function — echoes the later argument that ‘race’ as a category is itself a product of labor regime formation. — connects to: Colonization and slavery produced the unified black and Asian racial categories