New South Wales 6,503 Victoria 2,013 | Queensland 3,418 Western Australia 1,748 | |
Brazilian Australians (Portuguese: Brasileiro-australiano) refers to Australian citizens of Brazilian birth or descent.
Contents
- Brazilian immigration
- Two waves of immigration
- Demographics and Statistics
- Notable Brazilian Australians
- References
According to the 2011 Census, 14,509 Australians were born in Brazil while 12,234 claimed Brazilian ancestry, either alone or with another ancestry. There was a significant increase of 93.6 per cent from the 2006 Census which had recorded 6,647 Brazil-born people while 7,491 had claimed Brazilian ancestry.
Brazilian immigration
Although Brazilian migration in the eighteenth and nineteenth and centuries has not been documented, there is evidence of early Brazilian interest in Australia. However, concrete evidence of a Brazilian presence in Australia does not appear until the turn of the twentieth century, when census officials in 1901 counted 105 Brazilian-born in Australia.
Two waves of immigration
The first Brazilian migrants began arriving in Australia in the mid-1970s. They were attracted to Australia by an Australian government assistance scheme. The second wave of migration began in the late 1990s and continues today. It is widely attributed to growing socio-economic power within Brazil since the 1980s and Brazilian's strong desire to learn English. Australia is becoming an appealing destination to learn English after the United States and England – with a much milder climate and a smaller Brazilian community.
There has also been an influx of Brazilian students who have come to attend Australian universities. These students come independent of their families on study visas, and usually go home after completion of their studies. Brazilians have become the largest source of international student enrollments in Australia outside of Asia.
Demographics and Statistics
According to the 2001 Census conducted by the Australian Board of Statistics, there were almost 5,000 people living in Australia who identified as being of Brazilian origin. This was a 39% increase from 1996.
Sydney is home to the highest proportion of Brazilian-born immigrants (2,490). Victoria comes second (780), with Queensland (670) and Western Australia (380) ranking third and fourth.
Brazilians themselves may be of varied European, South American, African, Arab, East Asian and Amerindian ethnicity/ethnic origins.