There are two aspects to this question, one is the real difference between US and Brazilian race history and racism, and the other is how this was portrayed by brazilian historiography and media.

As you said, Brazil was a massive slave country, the bigger in americas in proportional numbers, much more than the USA. Almost half of the slaves brought to the americas went to brazil, and the whole country was based on slave labour, and this infuenced every aspect of social life in brazil. It was also the last country to abolish slavery in the Americas, only in 1888, and is a big reason to the end of the empire as it lead to a coup d etat.

But one big difference was the miscegenation: In the usa miscegenation was seen as a way to deteriorate the white race by mixing with black (as seen in the one-drop rule and the institutionalized segregation); in brazil it was the other way around, miscegenation was seen as a way to elevate the black race by mixing with white. Of course this a bit of generalization and had some social rules like being frowned upon if done by white woman but accepted with done by a white man. There also werent institutionalized segregation after the abolishment of slavery (but racism was and still is a structural aspect of brazilian society).

During the late XIX and early XX, scientific racism theory was popular with brazilians elites, and they tryed to ''''whitewash'''' (branqueamento) brazil by incentivized (not only) massive white immigration and miscigenation.

Now more about the historiography. In the aftermath of the indepedence (1822) there was a discussion inside brazilian intelectuality about how brazilian history and identity should be perceived and written. In 1840 the IHGB (Instituto de história e geografia brasileiro), after much discussion inside the academia, made a contest on how the national identity should be constructed, and the winner was Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius, a german, with the thesis of the racial pillars: Brazilian society was build from the relations of the three racial pillars, the white europeans, the ruler who 'civlized' the others races, who was superior and was elevating the others; the black africans, the hardworking people who build the country; and the indigenous, who had the knowhow of the land, and were docile. It goes more in depth than this but it was the idea that brazilian national identity should be build upon the combined strenghs of this three races.

This thesis influenced generations of brazilians historians and academics, and was part of the oficial narrative of brazilian history. After the superation of scientific racism in the 1920s and 30s, a new concept of race relations begin and it was the idea of racial democracy: Popularized by the book 'Casa Grande e Senzala' (in english: The Masters and the Slaves) from 1933, by Gilberto Freyre, in it Freyre attacked the idea of racial determinism, celebrates miscigenation and portrays colonial brazil with somewhat harmonous relations betwen master and slaves, and therefore blacks and whites, downplaying the violence of this relation. This book became a classic in brazilian literature, even though it was heavily criticized by later works, it was very influential during its time, not only in the academia but in also in state education and propaganda.

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So to summarized, the way racial relations developt in brazilian society was less segregated than in the US, but still heavily hierarchized. The construction of brazilian national identity was writen upon the idea of different races building the country with their individual virtues, and this idea was later expanded to the (mith of) racial democracy. But this is the oficial narrative, and the reality is that the heritage of 3 centuries of slave economy let to huge social scars that are very much still present. There were no project of compensation to ex slaves, and the racial division in brazil is very conected to economic division, and racism is still a structural part of brazilian society. But it is less evident than in the USA.