The Portuguese language is widely spoken in eight countries on four continents by a total of more than 200 million people. But to study it, there are few better places than 159 George Street, home to Brown's Department of Portuguese and Brazilian Studies.
Brown's Portuguese and Brazilian studies programs are generally considered to be the best in the country, although the University of Wisconsin, the University of California at Santa Barbara and Harvard also have strong programs. The department supports two scholarly journals, one online journal and a printing press, with faculty members frequently publishing material and giving talks around the world.
"We're humbly proud," said Luiz Valente, associate professor and chair of the department.
The department has enjoyed a considerable increase in student enrollment in recent years. According to Valente, in the last 10 years, the number of students studying Portuguese nationwide has grown by an average of 5 percent every five years.
"We've been the beneficiary of more interest in Portuguese, which also has helped our grad students because more jobs are available," he added.
In the early 1990s, around 15 students enrolled in the department's PB 11: "Intensive Portuguese" course, a one-semester introductory language course that meets for 10 hours every week. This year, the course has almost 30 students, and an equal number take the year-long introductory course.
Students find themselves attracted to the department for a number of reasons. For some, the sound of spoken Portuguese was reason enough to enroll in the class.
Ben Brown '08, a concentrator in the department, has no roots in a Portuguese-speaking region but still came to Brown knowing he wanted to learn it.
"It really is a beautiful language," he said. "It flows off your tongue. And Brazilian music is great."
For others, having ancestry in a Portuguese-speaking country gives them an inspiration to learn the language. Students from the Portuguese-speaking enclaves in the United States, referred to as Lusoamerica, have also been attracted to the department.
"Some excellent students have come from those communities," Valente said, "but not the majority."
Many faculty members in the department are native speakers with heritage in Portuguese-speaking areas, such as Brazil, Portugal and the Azores. Valente, who hails from Brazil, said that this diversity of backgrounds "creates an international atmosphere in the department," infused with a personal knowledge of the people and cultural subtleties of the regions.
The department has also designated about six professors in other departments as adjunct professors. These faculty members teach classes related to Portuguese and Brazilian studies within other fields, such as anthropology, history and international studies.
"The department is a little unusual, a little different, because it was originally conceived as an interdisciplinary department," Valente said. "Though the core is literature, language and culture, we have people that are social scientists, historians, et cetera."
In addition, the department receives grants from the Brazilian government and Portuguese organizations to support visiting scholars. Every year, a handful of professors from other universities join the department to teach classes not typically offered in the cirriculum.
"We have maintained lively and active exchanges with universities in Portugal and Brazil," Valente said. Brown's resources for Portuguese and Brazilian studies are useful for faculty from these places to conduct research for articles, dissertations and books.
For Brown, the sophomore concentrator, "visiting speakers bring historical perspectives" that make connections across broad disciplines.
One prominent visiting scholar is Fernando Henrique Cardoso, who was president of Brazil from 1995 to 2002 and now spends one month each year on campus. In 2003 he was appointed to a five-year term as professor at large specializing in sociology and the study of contemporary Brazil. During each of his one-month stays, Cardoso participates in seminars, gives talks and makes himself available to students.
"He feels at home here," Valente said. "He goes to the Ivy Room."
But Cardoso is not the only celebrity in the department. Professor Onésimo Almeida, who came to the United States from the Azores in 1972, has worked with Portuguese and Brazilian studies at Brown for almost 30 years. For 26 of those, he has hosted a half-hour educational television program on a Portuguese cable channel. So far, he has filmed over 800 episodes in New Bedford, Mass. and in locations abroad.
Almeida also gives around 20 guest lectures each year at other American universities as well as in Canada, Portugal and Germany, among other countries. He writes frequently - he is "up to my ears in publications, with publishers waiting for manuscripts for books I promised."
Yet despite all these other activities, Almeida still considers teaching to be his priority.
"I never miss classes," he said.
Portuguese and Brazilian studies concentrators are encouraged to take courses in other departments, such as history and Africana studies.
"You can view the culture, politics and history of a diverse portion of the world through a specific linguistic perspective," Brown said. "It is specific without limiting."
The list of courses in the Portuguese and Brazilian studies department is diverse and includes several classes taught in English. A general interest in South America or Africa often leads students to these classes, even if they have had no prior experience with the language.
"You can enter the department through learning language and work your way up or join in through the branches and work toward the roots," Almeida said.
However, for concentrators, learning the Portuguese language is required, as it enables a better understanding of the world that grew out of it. They must take at least four courses conducted in Portuguese and reach at least the equivalent of PB 40: "Writing and Speaking Portuguese" to meet the language requirement.
"You can't study a culture seriously unless you know the language," Valente said. "We place a lot of emphasis on language skills."
Nearly all concentrators in the department take one or two semesters abroad to solidify their language skills. Several programs are offered, but most concentrators choose the Brown-in-Brazil Program at the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro.
Established in 1984, the program attracts students from all concentrations and even from other U.S. universities. It was developed by Brown faculty so that the courses taken abroad are seamlessly integrated into the Brown curriculum.
"When students come back from Brazil, they've assimilated some of the culture - that really enriches their lives," Valente said. "It is a transition between beginning and advanced levels."
Students and faculty alike consider the move from undergraduate to graduate studies smooth, since students from both levels often take classes together. Due to its small size, the department is very closely knit, even hosting Friday evening chat sessions in which undergrad and grad students get together over sweet bread and soft drinks.
In the classroom, graduate students who serve as teaching assistants for undergraduate classes are frequently native speakers, providing their students with an authentic immersion experience.
The department's graduate program is "generally considered by our peers to be the best program in the country," Valente said. The Ph.D. program, he added, was the "culmination of our development," with the first doctorate awarded in 1995.
The history actually stretches back to 1977, during a decade in which the University was incorporating a more international focus into many departments. Under the heading of the Center for Portuguese and Brazilian Studies, interested faculty from Brown came together and taught courses. It was not until 1991 that the center was granted departmental status, and soon after, graduate students were busy working on theses and dissertations.
By the mid-1990s, these graduate students were placed into jobs at top universities, and according to Valente, "We solidified as a top department in the U.S."
Currently, 14 graduate students are working in the department and are at various stages in earning their degrees. Over the past five years, the department has maintained a nearly perfect graduate student yield, matriculating almost every student it admits.
Of the 20 or so applicants every year, only two or three are accepted. "That allows us to go after the individuals that we think are really the best," Valente said.
In the past, applicants who were denied and relegated to their second choice, Harvard, would commute to Brown to take classes here.
"We have a larger offering than Harvard," Almeida said. "Their Department of Romance Languages and Literatures is not as specific as our department."
Brown's department has also enjoyed 100 percent placement into the job market for students who have completed their degrees, despite a tight market.
Not all undergraduates in the department end up in the graduate school, however.
"They don't necessarily enter academics," Valente said. About six concentrators graduate each year, and "we have our fair share going to law school, business school and medical school."
In fact, since the 1980s, the department has seen several Program in Liberal Medical Education students concentrate in Portuguese and Brazilian studies. In the last six years, four Fulbright scholars have completed the concentration.
Facilitating graduate student research while teaching dozens of undergraduate classes and keeping its sparkling reputation consumes most of the department's energy.
"We can't do much more than what we're already doing," Almeida said. "We have a critical mass."
The University allowed the department to grow in 2002 by hiring Silvia Sobral as a lecturer and coordinator of the language program, drawing her away from Harvard, where she had rebuilt the Portuguese language department. More recently, the Department of Portuguese and Brazilian Studies joined with the history department in getting a professor in 16th, 17th and 18th century Portuguese history.
"Our next frontier is Lusophile Africa," Valente said. "We're very very strong in Brazil and Portugal, but there is room for growth for Africa."
Valente, Almeida and the rest of the department hope that the Plan for Academic Enrichment will support an additional faculty member specializing in the history and sociology of Portuguese-speaking Africa, which includes the nations of Angola, São Tomé and PrÃncipe, Cape Verde, Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau.
But Valente is optimistic that their ambitions will be supported by the University.
"Brown is becoming interested in African studies, so hopefully that will be a plus," he said. "With Ruth, we can look ahead."
