Shaping Doctors and Society

Abstract

This article is an exploratory approach to the study of the Portuguese medical press, between the 1880s and 1926, that is, from the last decades of the liberal monarchy (1820–1910) to the end of the First Republic (1910–1926). Around 130 medical journals were identified so far. They were divided in groups according to the place of publication, and a typology was established based on two combined criteria—contents and affiliation. The weekly journal A Medicina Contemporânea will be used as a sample, mainly because it exemplifies in a single journal the dual purpose of the Portuguese medical press taken as whole. The establishment of the medical press coincided with the emergence of mass press and doctors’ engagement in laboratory-based medicine, and constituted an apparatus with two aims in mind: shaping doctors not only technically and scientifically, but also ideologically with the aim of creating a market for their profession, building up a medical community, and a social and cultural elite; shaping society and improving the ‘race’ by taking care of the bodies and minds of the Portuguese, organizing public opinion through ideological indoctrination, and influencing political decision-making to make a republic regime viable.

KEYWORDS:

• Medical press
• Propaganda
• Portugal
• history of medicine
• constitutional mornarchy
• Frist Respublic

Acknowledgements

This research was carried out in the context of CIUHCT (Interuniversity Centre for the History of Science and Technology), which is funded by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (UID/HIS/00286/2013). The authors wish thank the anonymous referees for their comments and criticism, and to Jennifer Wallis and Sally Frampton for their always kind assistance and linguistic suggestions. A word of gratitude also goes to André Pereira for his technical assistance.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Paulo, Periódicos and Athias, Catálogo.

2. Van Remoortel et al. “Joining Forces,” 1–3.

3. The digital form poses problems to the field of periodical studies and history, which has been amply discussed in the literature. van Remoortel et al. “Joinig Forces,” 1–3; Lathan and Sholes, “The Rise,” 517–31; Ardis, “Towards a Theory;” Brake, “On Print Culture,” 125–36; Allen, “Lost and Now Found;” Fyfe, “An Archaeology,” 564–77.

4. Latham and Sholes “The Rise,” 517.

5. Steel and Broersma, “Redefining,” 235–7.

6. Tengarrinha, História, 191–201 and Sousa et al. eds. Pensamento, 16–51

7. Regarding science and medicine in newspapers see Simões, Carneiro, Diogo, “Riding the Wave” and Almeida, Saúde.

8. The Portuguese obviously do not constitute a race, but this was the term then used.

9. Together with Jornal da Sociedade de Ciências Médicas, Bulletin da Associação dos Médicos Portugueses, Archivos d’Hygiene e Patología Exoticas, and Polytechnia, all published in Lisbon; Movimento Medico, published in Coimbra, and Porto Medico, in Porto. N. A. Association Internationale.

10. Amaral, “A Geração de 1911.”

11. Mergoupi-Savaidou, Papanelopoulo, Carneiro, “Popularization,” 966–77; Papanelopoulo, Nieto-Galan and Perdiguero, eds., Popularizing.

12. Topham, “Historicizing,” 310–8; Hilgartner, “The Dominant View,” 519–39; Porter, Popularization; Michaels, “Medical Propaganda,” 159–78.

13. Occasionally the term ‘vulgarização’ (vulgarisation) appears as an equivalent.

14. Lippmann's expression in Public Opinion.

15. Carneiro and Amaral, “Propaganda,” 138–66.

16. Ramos, “A Formação,” 483–528; Fernandes, “Aspectos,” 335–40.

17. Amaral, “The Emergence.”

18. Quental, Causas.

19. Cunningham and Williams, eds., Laboratory.

20. Luz, “A Propagação,” 239–432; Carneiro et al.“Geology,” 331–54.

21. Abbott, System of Professions.

22. Ramos, “A Formação,” 499.

23. Amaral, “The Emergence.”

24. Paul, Sorcerer's.

25. Amaral, “The Emergence,” and Carneiro and Amaral, “Propaganda.”

26. Nieto-Galan, “Antonio Gramsci,” 453–78; Sassoon, “The People,” 137–68; Lears, “The Concept,” 567–9.

27. A feature of propaganda according to Ellul. Ellul, Propaganda, 70 and 214.

28. On the complexities of defining periodicals, see Philpotts, “Defining.”

29. The FMUC was the only to give the title of doctor; graduates from the LMSS and PMSS were called Mr., but they could be appointed for medical positions on par with Coimbra graduates.

30. Carneiro and Amaral, “Propaganda,” 140.

31. Doctors trained in India were not allowed to practice medicine on mainland Portugal.

32. Carneiro, Simões, Diogo, “Enlightenment Science,” 591–619; Reis, “Scientific Dissemination,” 83–118.

33. Only in 1933, during Salazar dictatorship, was a single medical professional association created, operating nationwide to this day, the Ordem dos Médicos. Reis, História da Ordem, 19–50–118.

34. On magazines, see Latham, “The Mess.”

35. Lathan, “Affordance.”

36. Weisz, “The Emergence,” 536–75.

37. Ibid.

38. Pereira, “A Evolução,” 365–68. The director was António Bettencoturt Rodrigues (1854–1933) who had graduated in medicine in Paris and worked with Jean-Martin Charcot.

39. Ibid.

40. Carneiro & Amaral, “Propaganda”.

41. Both published by the Institute Rocha Cabral the Travaux de Laboratoire aimed at the international scientific community and Actualidades Biológicas for a national educated but not specialized readership. The Arquivo de Patologia was associated with cancer research.

42. Hacking, Taming.

43. Foucault, Naissance de la Biopolitique and Gougelet, “The World,” 43–66.

44. Conrad, “Medicalization;” Crawford, “Healthism.”

45. It is worth mentioning that doctors, especially belonging to the Generation of 1911, appropriated these themes and wrote on them in the general press, in addition to the medical periodicals.

46. Bearing in mind that most periodicals are heterogeneous, as Latham and Sholes, and Green have emphasised. Latham and Sholes, “The Rise,” Green, “Around 1910.”

47. Brake, “Time's Turbulence,” 115–27; Easley, “Victorian Networks,” 111–4; Fagg, Pethers, Vandome. “Networks,” 93–104; Murphy, “Visualizing Networks,” iii–xv.

48. Reis, then Portuguese currency. Association Internationale, 65–8.

49. Dilanne, “Forms of Affect,” 11.

50. Marques, História, vol.2, 31 and 185–6.

51. According to the editorial note MC 2 (1884): 121.

52. Lippmann, Phantom Public and Public Opinion.

53. Mergoupi-Savaidou, Papanelopoulou, & Carneiro, “Popularization.”

54. Judt, When the Facts, 78–9.

55. [Untitled and unsigned editorial note], MC 1 (1883), 2.

56. Bombarda's brands of monism and materialism are analysed in Barata-Moura “Miguel Bombarda,” 61.

57. The psychiatric Hospital Miguel Bombarda was equipped with a panopticum in 1896, and its architecture has features, which became common only in the 1920s and 30s.

58. Cintra, ed., Miguel, 42–43.

59. Cintra, ed., Miguel; Fernandes, A Psiquiatria, and Madureira, “A Estatística,” 283–303.

60. Bombarda, “Degenerescência,” 217–8; Pereira, Darwin, 550–2.

61. Amado et al. “Miguel,” 321–30.

62. Vieira, Conhecer.

63. Pais, Sousa Martins.

64. Cabral, Elogio.

65. In 1900, in Portugal one in five children would die in infancy, and one pregnant woman in 100 would die in childbirth. Regarding tuberculososis, the rate in 1898 was 297–396 TB patients in 100,000 inhabitants. Alves, A Faculdade, 67–69

66. Sousa was a baby orphan when the Count of Murça adopted him.

67. Sousa, A Parvónia.

68. Bombarda, quoted in Mira, Manuel, 183.

69. Mira, Manuel, 181–182.

70. Mussell, “The Matter”

71. Monteiro argued that advertisements in MC appeared in the first decade of the 20th century, which is not exact. Monteiro A Medicina, 25–29.

72. This series was later published in book form, in 1885. Sena, Os Alienados.

73. Daston & Galison, “Image.”

74. Bombarda, “Epilepsia,” 187. Image very blurred.

75. [Untitled and unsigned editorial note] MC 2 (1884): 121.

76. [Presumably Bombarda] “Eleições,” 281.

77. Ramos, “A formação da intelligentsia,” 490.

78. Mussell, “The Matter” and Miller, “Genre,” 151–67.

79. N.A. “Folhetim: A Syphilis,” 1.

80. N.A. “Um Principe,” 31.

81. Raposo, “Hospitaes,” 40–42.

82. ‘A degenerescência moral do povo português como factor de expansão da tuberculose,’ name of a session of the meeting 3° Congresso da Liga Nacional contra a Tuberculose, Coimbra, 21–24 April, 1904, the chairman being Bombarda.

83. Castro, A Felicidade, 60.

84. Cardoso, “Sociedade,” 123–152.

85. “Conselho Superior d’Instrução Pública. Relatorios dos Delegados das Escolas Médicas de Lisboa e Porto,”MC 5 (1885), 317–8; 325–8; 333–40; 342–4; 344–7.

86. It is hard to tell whether this claim is sound. Although the number of students that graduated per year from the LMSS is known, similar information for Coimbra and Porto requires further investigation.

87. [Untitled and unsigned editorial notes] MC 1 (1883): 147–50; MC 2 (1884): 73–4.

88. [Untitled and unsigned editorial notes] MC 2 (1884): 49–50.

89. [Untitled and unsigned editorial notes] MC 2 (1884): 121.

90. Jorge, [Printed letter addressed to the journal], 129.

91. This motto was used in official documents and correspondence. Alves, “Saúde,” 111 and Garnel “Médicos,” 230.

92. This was the largest professional category, more than army and navy officers (19.7%) and lawyers and magistrates (17.9%). Graça, “Diferenciação,” and Garnel, “Médicos,” 230–57.

93. Sassoon, “The People,” 154.

94. Ellul's technique is more than machine technology and refers to any complex of standardized means for attaining a pre-defined goal achieved through deliberate and rationalized behavior. Merton, Robert K. “Foreword.” In Ellul, Technological Society, VI.

95. Lippman, Public Opinion, 248.

96. Herman and Chomsky, “Manufacturing.”

Additional information

Funding

This research was carried out in the context of CIUHCT (Interuniversity Centre for the History of Science and Technology), which is funded by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (UID/HIS/00286/2013).