Acknowledgments

The research and writing behind this book were possible thanks to the support of the Center for Latin American Studies and the Nicholson Center for British Studies at the University of Chicago, a Fulbright-Hays DDRA, an ACLS Dissertation Completion Fellowship, the European University Institute, the Academic Senate, Humanities Institute and Office of the Provost at UC Davis, a Hellman Fellowship, and the UC Humanities Research Institute.

This book began as an effort to come to terms with a keyword – “colony” – and its many modern ramifications, particularly “colonization.” Having been raised in a colony myself, disentangling the meanings of such terms required many moves, linguistic shifts, mental fortitude, and time away from loved ones. The road has been long, but I have been fortunate to count on the solidarity, shelter, and guidance of many along the way.

I am grateful for my teachers, first and foremost Arcadio Díaz Quiñones, a beacon of hope in dark times whose generosity, depth, and friendship have shaped me as a historian and as human being attuned to the senses and their rhythms. I wish I could convey my gratitude in person to the late Colin Palmer for his encouraging dialogue and unstintingly high expectations. At the University of Chicago, I was lucky to have Dain Borges as a poignant and supportive mentor and thank him for his wisdom, patience, and the unique way he instills humanity to the often impersonal rigors of academia. My edifying conversations with Mauricio Tenorio were punctuated by flashes of insight as only he can summon, and his mentorship anchored my work in the ability to be moved by history.

I also wish to thank Agnes Lugo Ortiz, Paul Cheney, Ana Maria Lima, João Almino, José Miguel Wisnik, Ramón Gutiérrez, and Brody Fischer for their support during my doctoral studies as well as my colleagues for their camaraderie and dialogue, especially Adrian Anagnost, Marcel Anduiza Pimentel, Ramesh Bhagirat, Sabine Cadeau, Beppi Chiuppani, Matthew Barton, Rogério de Souza Farias, Karma Frierson, Johnhenry Gonzalez, Carmine Grimaldi, Aiala Levy, Casey Lurtz, Erin McCollough, Amy McLachlan, Christopher D. Moore, Meghan L. Morris, Tessa Murphy, Matthew Nestler, Timo Schaeffer, Daniel Webb, Maria Welch, and the late and much missed Luis Fernando Granados. Among the most important and life-affirming experiences in Chicago was meeting Soraia Sales Dornelles and Karina Moreira Ribeiro da Silva e Melo, who quickly became prized intellectual companions. At the European University Institute, I profited greatly from the mentorship of Regina Grafe, Lucy Riall, and Pieter Judson, and conversations with Amuitz Garmendia, Eva-Maria Muschik, Máté Rigó, Giulia Bonazza, Pablo Hérnandez Sau, Bruno Martinho, Katalin Stráner, Aris Trantidis, Andrej Milivojevic, Alessandro Bonvini, Miquel de la Rosa, and Damien Clavel.

At UC Davis, I have found a supportive community of colleagues. I thank them all heartily but especially Gregory Downs, Stacy Fahrenthold, Andrés Reséndez and Marian Schlotterbeck for reading parts of the manuscript; and Corrie Decker, Rachel Jean-Baptiste, Lisa Materson, Omnia El-Shakry, Lorena Oropeza, Daniel Stolzenberg, Kathy Olmsted, and Rachel St. John for key guidance. I am also grateful for the students whose enthusiasm, intellectual commitment, and originality kept me on my feet: Manoel Rendeiro Neto, Leonardo de Oliveira Silva, Jake Barrett, Viridiana Hernández, Joel Olea Calixto, Génesis Lara, Lucía Luna Victoria Indacochea, Francisco Ulloa García, Priscilla Cisternas, Alejandro Rentería, Julio Aguilar, and Álvaro Grompone.

Despite the challenges of researching in Brazil over the course of many years, my day-to-day in the vaults remained inspiring and enlightening in large part thanks to Eduardo Cavalcante, a treasured friend and a wise Virgil who helped me find my way through archival limbos. At the Arquivo Nacional in Rio de Janeiro, I wish to thank Suelem Demuner, Helba Mattos, and Sátiro Nunes for their unflagging disposition to help, Wagner Bueno for useful references relative to the Navy records, and the staff at the sala de consulta for their everyday support. For all their attention, I also thank the teams and student interns at the IHGB, the Arquivo do Itamaraty, the APERJ, the Arquivo do Museu Imperial in Petrópolis and the Biblioteca Nacional, especially the wonderful Jayme Spinelli. Colleagues who crossed paths with me at the archives made my days there lively and instructive. Thank you to Nora Cássia de Oliveira, my earliest archival companion, Cassia Roth, Bruna Motta Dourado, Juri Bottura, Martine Jean, Alexander Ponsen, Roberto Saba, John Marquez, Tâmis Parron, Isadora Moura Mota, Hendrik Kraay, Rodrigo Goyena Soares, Dale Graden, Tyson Reeder, Amy Chazkel, José C. Moya, Barbara Weinstein, and Henrique Espada Lima.

At the Universidade Federal Fluminense, I found the most acute kind of dialogue with María Verónica Secreto as my project took shape, and benefited from conversations with Carlos Gabriel Guimarães, Norberto Ferreras, Tâmis Parron, Leonardo Marques and Paulo Cruz Terra. Similarly, the Vale do Paraíba group led by Mariana Muaze and the late Ricardo H. Salles welcomed me warmly to their discussions. I particularly thank Thiago Campos Pessoa for offering invaluable insights on shared aspects of our research. Two conference visits to Campinas likewise helped me develop the project. One was the FAPESP-funded “Globalização da Cultura no século XIX” school in Campinas in 2012, where I learned a great deal from Lenny Ureña Valerio, Javier Uriarte, Rodrigo Camargo de Godoi, María Vicéns, and Eliseo Jacob. At the summer academy hosted by Unicamp and Humboldt University the following year, I had the privilege of exchanging ideas with Antoine Acker, Gabriela Sampaio, Camillia Cowling, Karina Melo, Soraia Dornelles, Henrique Espada Lima, Alexandre Fortes, and Sidney Chalhoub. My archival travels across Brazil were possible – and meaningful – thanks to the kind hospitality of many. Thank you to Karina, Marcos, and Theo Melo, and Soraia, Léia, and Carlos Casanova in Porto Alegre; Nora de Oliveira and Gabriela Sampaio in Salvador; Fernanda Luciani and Tâmis, André and Paulo Parron in São Paulo; Valeria Augusti and Angela Steward in Belém; and Beatriz Mamigonian, Henrique Espada Lima, and Amy Chazkel in Florianópolis.

I greatly benefited from the feedback offered by the Latin American History Workshops at Berkeley and Davis; Peter Beattie, Beatriz Mamigonian, Andrés Reséndez and Margaret Chowning during an early manuscript workshop; Barbara Weinstein and Federica Morelli at the “Global Decolonization Workshop” held at the University of London in Paris; Alex Borucki and Ian Read in a Conference of Southern California Brazilian Studies; Molly Ball during a panel she organized for BRASA; and two anonymous reviewers. The members of the History Department at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, were excellent hosts when they invited me to share some of my research as part of the Sherman Emergent Scholar Lecture, and I also thank Dain, Barbara Weinstein and Hal Langfur for joining. Conversations with Tâmis Parron, Miquéias Mügge, Jeffrey Needell, Roderick Barman, and more recently, even if at a distance, Alain El Youssef and Télio Anísio Cravo have helped me to rethink key aspects of my work. Revising and preparing the manuscript for a final send-off seemed like a daunting task until Elena K. Abbott offered to help. I thank her for her tactful guidance. At Cambridge University Press, I thank Cecelia Cancellaro, Victoria Phillips, Kris Lane, and Matthew Restall for kindly and efficiently steering this book to publication and Shaheer Anwarali and Trent Hancock for their help through production and copyediting. I am also grateful to George Chakvetadze for designing the maps and to Victoria George for crafting the index.

Friends dispersed across the United States, and in Rio, Lisbon, Madrid, Puerto Rico and many other places sustained me in the long process of turning an inkling into a fully-fledged book. For their love, their visits, and support, I offer my heartful thanks to Zulma Dávila, Alma Concepción, Paul, Carolina, Nicolás and Lucía Firbas, Jussara Quadros, Andréa Melloni, Pedro Meira Monteiro, Fernando Acosta, Edwige Fils-Aimé, Laura León Llerena, Lily Huang, Mary Bortscheller, Chris Moore, Jacob Shapiro, Miranda Hart, Raquel Ferrão, Giuseppe Ballacci, Jimena Campillo, Pablo Moíño, Simone Dubeux, Luis Cotinguiba, Madiano Marcheti, Arno Fritz Brandes, Mariana Iguatemi, Adrian Anagnost, Manol Georgieff, little Sophia, Oscar Porto, Susana Gurovich, Daniela Alatorre, Judit Ferrando, Norberto Ferreras, Mariana and Facundo Ferreras Secreto, Nilda Merlo, Victor Giraldo, Luiz Montenegro, Flora Thomson-DeVeaux, Diogo de Carvalho Cabral, Camila Lima e Silva, Ana Paula Carrijo, Diego de Assis, Javier Uriarte, Natalia Valencia, Edgardo Dieleke, Julieta Mortati, Claudia Leal, Eva-Maria Muschik, Suzanne Muschik and (then little) Emma and Hans, Alison Easter, Benjamin Yen-yi Fong, as well as Jaya, Ziggy and Noam (Chickpea), Alex Leader, Bernardo, Mateo, Xulián, and Martín Canga, Fernando Montero Castrillo, Sebastián Sánchez, Monaliza da Silva, Femi Disu-Oakley and Dylan, Elliott, and Coltrane Oakley, José Ignacio Padilla, Cecilia Palmeiro, Pablo Ruiz, Mollie Ferguson, Elena Schneider, Erika Miranda, Bárbara Abadía-Rexach, Zane and Oscar Stone, and Ellie Schlotterbeck-Stone.

I especially thank Gabriela Ruiz Gurovich for her worldliness, curiosity, and devotion to friendship; Viviana Gelado for her solidarity, her fierce brilliance, and her fantastic taste in music; and Verónica Secreto for her cariño, openheartedness, and groundedness. In Rio, I also cherished the scintillating conversations with, and the special company of, Rodrigo Carrijo. Across different times and geographies, Rocío de Félix Dávila has been a reciprocal witness to numerous beginnings whose flicker, genius, and humor are always with me, and, I hope, may carry on in little Darío. Emilio de Antuñano, a loyal friend and one of my finest interlocutors, helped shape this project from its earliest iterations and I count on his friendship as one of life’s unexpected gifts. Marian Schlotterbeck has provided an unrivalled degree of perspective as I completed this project. Beyond her kindness and dedication, I treasure the joy of her companionship.

My family has offered a vital balance of comfort and chaos as any family can and probably must. For their lifelong encouragement, I thank Jorge R. Dávila, María Meléndez, Joe Rivas, Michelle Rivas, and Elda Meléndez Altieri, including for a visit on the research trail in Portugal. I am grateful to Juan F. Pérez Colón, my father, for teaching me the virtues of selflessness and generosity that lie at the center of my vocation to teach. I thank my mother, Isabel Meléndez Altieri, for her searching desire to learn and her ability to wonder and be wondered by this world, which has afforded me a model of what it means to be a lifelong learner. Julián Enrique Pérez Meléndez, Isela Ortiz Nieves, little Marcelo and even littler Juliana have unwittingly goaded me to complete this book in order to spend more time together. Ian Lesser, Chelsey D’Arrigo, and my nieces Remi and Portia have taught me a great deal about the little things that matter, and I thank the former two for a visit to Brazil. And I offer a special thank you to Howard and Stephanie Lesser for their attentive care and generosity over the years, especially during many a visit when they had to tend to a busy writer locked away in between meals and walks.

My deepest gratitude goes to Christopher N. Lesser, who has tirelessly accompanied me in making this book. As a scholar and editor of the best kind, he has patiently followed this project through its multiple stages, read more versions of the manuscript than I can remember, and offered sage advice. His ability to see, to really see, is unparalleled. As my life partner, he has seen me through thick and thin during many years of study, travel, and work, celebrating small accomplishments and offering loving encouragement in difficult times. In all the places we have been, he has given us a home. His wisdom and kindness marvel me. His love and care sustain me. I hope to someday find a way to thank him properly. In the meantime, I dedicate this book to him.