Hope, Affect, Mobility

This chapter examines the narratives of upward mobility through beauty that are interwoven throughout diverse forms of Brazilian media—from journalistic accounts of recently discovered models to the carefully crafted storylines of soap operas and televised beauty pageants. It compares these accounts with ethnographic research among working-class parents who send their daughters to talent agencies or modeling schools. These girls' parents and teachers pin their hopes on performances of beauty because they understand the female body itself as a form of capital that promises a better future. This affective promise of a better future, however, becomes a moral injunction as well, sexualizing and racializing, in very particular ways, the poor women who are said to deserve upward mobility, emphasizing virtuous sexual behavior, European features, and straighter hair as essential components for success.

Aesthetics · Affect (linguistics) · Art · Beauty · Ethnography · Literature · Narrative · Sociology · Virtuous circle and vicious circle · Anthropology · Communication · Diaspora, migration, transnational identity · Gender Studies · Migration, Ethnicity, and Economy · Sex work and related issues