Teotonio R de Souza

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Teotonio R de Souza is an Indo-Portuguese historian and the founder-director of the Goa-based Xavier Centre of Historical Research, at Alto Porvorim. Since 1995 he is based in Portugal, where he heads the Department of History in the Universidade Lusófona de Humanidades e Tecnologias. He is Fellow of the Portuguese Academy of History since 1983, and of the Sociedade de Geografia de Lisboa since 2000. De Souza is of Goan origin, and was educated mostly in this former colony which was ruled by Portugal from 1510 to 1961. He belonged to the Goa Jesuits during 36 years, including as Professed member of that Religious Order until he requested and was granted dispensation by the Holy See in 1995. He recoverd Portuguese nationality in 1995, and was granted OCI (Overseas Citizenship of India) by the Government of India in 2007.

[edit] Writing, etc

Souza has written his PhD thesis broadly challenging the view that Portuguese rule in South Asia resulted in a period of golden rule in Goa in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. He is the author and editor of many books and research papers. His partial memoirs are penned in a book titled Goa To Me (New Delhi, Concept,1994). On completion of 60 years, Souza was felicitated with a festschrift edited by C.J. Borges, S.J. and M. N. Pearson, Metahistory: History questioning History, Lisboa, Nova Vega, 2007, pp. 606 containing personal tributes and 43 research papers contributed by historians and social scientists from the world over. The Lusophone University of Lisbon awarded him its Gold Medal of Merit on the same occasion.