Doctors, Lawyers, and Philosophy in Nineteenth-Century Brazil

Abstract

The article critically examines the traditional hypothesis that nineteenth-century Brazilian philosophers were mostly trained in law and endowed with all the vices associated to the so-called bacharelismo, that is, the social and intellectual ethos of Brazilian law graduates. To this end, it presents an overview of nineteenth-century Brazilian philosophers according to their academic training. From this overview, it becomes clear that lawyers are not the most significant representatives of nineteenth-century Brazilian philosophy. However, the presence of physician-philosophers in this overview raises the question of whether they could be grouped alongside lawyers, thereby expanding the category of bachelor degree holders. The discussion of this issue makes clear that, from the standpoint of philosophy, although physicians were also bachelor degree holders, they played very different roles from those of lawyers and cannot be equated with them. The discussion allows one to conclude that the profile of nineteenth-century Brazilian philosophers according to their academic training is far more complex than that described by the traditional hypothesis in question, which urgently requires revision.

Keywords: 19th-century doctors. 19th-century lawyers. The culture of degree-holding elitism in Brazil. 19th-century Brazilian philosophy.