The word ‘crioulo’, Melo informs, has a conflicted history, and ‘disparate usage across geographies.’ Most likely derived from the Latin root ‘creare’ to ‘create’ and the related Portuguese verb ‘criar’ to ‘raise or bring up’, in its initial usage 'crioulo' referred to black slaves born in the Americas, a word used to differentiate them from slaves brought over from Africa. But what did the word mean in Goa? Luis Cabral de Olivier, left this entry for the word ‘crioulo’ in a dictionary of ‘imperial’ Portuguese terms: ‘The term crioulo was used in Goa in a sense different to the one it is usually associated. The word served to designate either an adopted child or a servant close to the family raised at home from childhood.’ It interesting how over time 'crioulos' a word linked to slavery and African heritage, and mired in race miscegenation transformed to mean 'adopted' in the Goan context. Many a ‘crioulo’ in Goa, did indeed have African heritage. Goans who had migrated to Africa, at times, returned with indigenous African servants who might have been in their employ there. Fatima Gracias hypothesises that freed slaves, after the abolition of slavery within the Portuguese empire, might have been adopted. Given that the Santa Casa had in their custody abandoned slaves as well as orphans, it is hardly a stretch to assume that the Santa Casa would have encouraged people to adopt slaves, no doubt as labour rather than as children to cherish. And finally, there were African troops stationed in Goa; anecdotal evidence tells us there were illegitimate children of biracial Goan-African stock who were adopted by families. Read full text here:https://selma-carvalho.squarespace.com/nonfiction-1/2017/10/7/of-crioulos-and-poskim
Best,Editorial team
