A not so common idea: autobiographies of Portuguese emigrants in the USA

Abstract

This article focuses on autobiographies of Portuguese emigrants in the USA published outside standard literary circuits. The analysis draws from the materials collected during fieldwork in New Jersey where a surprising number of migrants’ written self-portraits were found. The paper examines the autobiographies as an expression of self and social empowerment to counter the established negative stereotyping linked to the Portuguese emigrant in Portugal. The four authors under analysis emigrated during different periods of the 20th century, marked by continuous Portuguese migration flows. From the outset, as they fled from misery, poverty, and lack of perspectives, these practically unschooled e/immigrants would have been improbable writers, yet they became motivated authors of their memories and life experiences. The analysis highlights the heuristic value and social relevance of such autobiographies both in their socioanthropological meaning, and as historical portraits of Portugal and the Portuguese migration.