Unga identiteter i förändringens Portugal: En postkolonial analys av unga, universitetsutbildade portugisers identitet i relation till de forna kolonierna och de förändrade relationerna till dessa länder

Abstract

A radical change is taking place in the world today: some former colonies are now booming economically while several former colonizers are suffering from economic crisis. Postcolonial theory states that old structures from the colonization are keeping the South poor and the North rich. Today there’s a shift in these structures as former colonizers Spain and Portugal are forced to ask for economical support from their former colonies. The colonial discourse separated white from black and depicted the population in the colonies as the absolute antithesis of the Europeans. In Portugal circulated also lusotropicalism, an ideology that claimed Portugal as absolutely free of racism, a statement with great influence in the postcolonial Portugal. On the basis of semi-structured focus groups I will in this paper do a discourse analysis of young, university educated Portuguese identity/ies in relation to the former colonies and the changing relations to these countries. This will be done by investigating whether the Portuguese self-image and the view of the colonized and the colonies seem to be changing as a result of the changing relations, and by analyzing to what extent colonial and lusotropicalistic discourses are reflected in the respondent’s narratives of the colonies and its inhabitants. Even though young Portuguese of today grow up after decolonization, they tend to repeat the lusotropicalistic and the colonial discourse. Yet, despite this one can see a new discourse taking form around the crisis and the changing relations between Portugal and the former colonies. Opposite to the colonial discourse this discourse is forming an identity as rather inferior and insecure as Brazil is seen as the biggest power in the lusophone world whilst Portugal’s influence is lessening by the day. Still, the connection between Portugal and its former colonies is growing stronger today in the same pace as the identification with Europe decreases for the young Portuguese in the study. A lusofication of the identity is taking place as a consequence of Portugal’s troubles in the Eurozone and the rise of the colonies, as Portugal chooses to tie itself harder to the former colonies when their position and influence in the EU is decreasing.