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From https://www.languagemagazine.com/2017/08/portuguese-independent-lens/

Portuguese through an Independent Lens
by Kristal Bivona
August 7, 2017

Portuguese instruction faces some challenges that are by no means unique to Portuguese but also affect the instruction of other imperialist languages, such as English, Spanish, and French. One such challenge is the underrepresentation of cultures and peoples who identify as indigenous and African. Of course, this gross underrepresentation is not limited to language-teaching materials, nor is it occurring in a vacuum within the field of education—it is pandemic in cultural production from formerly imperial or colonized places everywhere, as evident, for example, in the lack of cultural and racial diversity in film and television. As a result, language teachers often present a version of the target culture that misrepresents the reality of the places about which they are teaching. In the case of Portuguese, which faces a dearth of published teaching materials compared to other imperialist languages, textbooks present a whitened Brazil, only mentioning Afro-Brazilian and Indigenous culture and history as side notes.

As instructors, if we want our students to have a deeper engagement with underrepresented groups in the target culture, we need to get creative. The program at the Claremont Consortium is exemplary in building in opportunities for the students to practice Portuguese outside of the classroom and to learn about Afro-Brazilian culture, research, and experiences. 

Read more about the program and its involvement with the Instituto Cultural Steve Biko in Bahia, Brazil, at https://www.languagemagazine.com/2017/08/portuguese-independent-lens/