EUGENICS THOUGHT AND EDUCATION

FORMATIVE PRINCIPLES OF BRAZILIAN NATIONALITY IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE 20TH CENTURY

Abstract

The article aims the study of eugenic thought in education and its relationship with formative principles of Brazilian nationality in the first half of the 20th century. The documental and bibliographical research methodology focuses on the analytical procedure of written press sources. Materials from the Boletim de Eugenía, the publication of the Instituto Brasileiro de Eugenia and the Comissão Central Brasileira de Eugenia, published between January 1929 and June 1933, were consulted. It is considered that the Boletim de Eugenía purposes were driven by a socially and politically well-positioned literate intellectuality, which had as one of its central objectives the pedagogical interposition in school curricula and in teacher training. It is verified that the prerogative of “eugenic education” would be to select and preserve the hereditary requirements of those considered genetically apt and useful to the country, called “well endowed”.