When Brazilian literature is taught at universities in the USA, it is almost always taught in translation, since no one is capable of reading it in Portuguese. Thirdly, the world-renowned authors from Latin America (Gabriel García Márquez, Mario Vargas Llosa, Octavio Paz, Jorge Luis Borges, Julio Cortázar, Manuel Puig, Isabel Allende) already have a huge presence and brand recognition in the market, making it difficult for other brands to get a niche. This has effects all the way down the educational system - elementary schools may have (largely ineffective and useless) instruction in Spanish, but no primary or secondary schools teach Portuguese, and only a tiny fraction of colleges and universities do. And while these professors may also read and/or teach French, virtually none of them have studied Portuguese. Latin American literature has an infra-structure in American universities, a large number of professors who know the culture and the authors. At the college level, Spanish is by far the most popular foreign language for study, usurping the position that once belonged to French. American airports, subways, public offices now have signage in Spanish as well as English. Why? The USA has a large number of immigrants from Mexico, and an increasing number from Central America. Secondly, when Americans think of Latin America, they think of countries where Spanish is spoken. Translations of literature from abroad make up an insignificant part of the American literary scene, something quite different from the situation in Brazil, where translations of works by foreign authors may outnumber those by Brazilian writers. First and foremost, the American domestic literary market is so enormous that American readers have a plethora of authors and genres to choose from when they want to pick up a book. Brazilian literature abroad, and particularly its reception in the USA, suffers from a number of factors.
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