The Daily Life of Italian and Italian-Descendant Children in Tenements, Work and School (Sao Paulo, Late 19th And Early 20th Century)

Abstract

From the late 19th century onwards, men, women and children from the Italian peninsula started playing an increasingly relevant role in the history of Sao Paulo, Brazil. The text herein aims to investigate the presence of Italian and Italian-descendant children in Sao Paulo, especially among the lower social classes, focusing on their daily survival conditions and also in their roles as workers and students. In order to carry out this investigation, our time frame spans the two last decades of the 19th century and the first two decades of the 20th century – a period of significant arrivals of Italian immigrants to Sao Paulo. It was also a fruitful time in terms of the creation of Italian Schools and School Groups in neighborhoods where immigrants lived, as well as the creation of media content, written in both Italian and Portuguese, covering everyday life in factories and houses. Document analysis of references from Cultural History and the History of Childhood, as well as newspapers, official letters, consular dispatches and reports, public school yearbooks and publications about the city of Sao Paulo was performed. This revealed that Italian and Italian-descendant children learned, together with their parents, to live, coexist and survive living in unhealthy places, with little or no access to city benefits, usually with insufficient or inadequate food. Despite the many barriers to attending school, many parents faced strenuous sacrifices so that their children could go to an Italian School or to a Sao Paulo public school.