The ‘Good’ Colonizer

The ‘Good’ Colonizer is an archetypal character in Portuguese national identity, brandished during the Estado Novo dictatorial regime to justify its colonial presence as benevolent, natural, peaceful and cordial. The nature of this archetype is explored and critiqued in a video essay that traces the steps of a Portuguese man, António, who settles in Bissau during the final decade of the Portuguese overseas empire, from 1965 to 1974. Vítor Serra developed António’s story by interweaving his own family’s oral history, historical research into the lives of settlers in Guinea-Bissau, and critical considerations on the nature of coloniality and memory.