Allegories of exceptionalism: Lusotropicalism in mass culture (1960–74)

The concept of lusotropicalism inspired various stereotypes about Portugal and the Portuguese, namely the idea they were more adaptable to the tropics because of their alleged plasticity – materialized in an adaptation to different climates, mobility and the ability to miscegenate – and more successful colonizers than the rest of the Europeans. The maintenance and reproduction of lusotropicalism was supported by a set of national fantasies, which precluded the political disagreements that traversed colonial society. Those fantasies proliferated through the cultural realm, particularly in mass culture events that offered a fertile ground for interpreting and understanding the dissemination of lusotropicalism as an ‘imagined political community’. In this article I intend to forge new connections between the everyday politics of nationalism and the cultural politics of mass culture, seeking new forms to identify the ubiquity of nationalist discourses.