Maria Lacerda de Moura na Revista Estudios (1930-1936): anarquismo individualista e filosofia da natureza

Abstract

This work presents an analysis of articles published by brazilian thinker Maria Lacerda de Moura in the spanish journal Estudios (1930-1936). In these articles we identified elements for the creation of a libertarian unicist philosophy of nature, hence our goal to understand the purpose of this author beyond their critical contributions to the relationship established between nature and humanity in the industrial bourgeois society. The press was a privileged instrument in the late nineteenth century to the organization of the anarchist movement and diffusion of knowledge and countercultural ideals and values of the dominant ideology. Aimed at social transformation, editorials with anarchist bias emerged, attentive to the scientific discoveries of the time and bringing critical elements to the existing society. In addition to the dissemination of knowledge, libertarians also questioned the role of class and they gave their own meanings to scientific knowledge and concepts in order to turn them into an instrument for revolutionary change. In this sense, we identify in articles published in the journal Estudios, linked to the field of spanish anarcho-individualism, the construction of various philosophies of nature with a view to libertarian society. In this period of strengthening of global nation-states after the First World War and the rise of totalitarian states, militants and anarchist thinkers questioned the technological progress, democracy and the institutions of bourgeois society. In this perspective, they constituted different views of nature which opposed the one defended by the ruling class, based on a normalizing scientific knowledge and a society of control. Libertarian critique of authoritarian policies exercised by fascist governments was based on critical and emancipatory reinterpretations of scientific topics as diverse as eugenics, neomalthusianism, naturism, sex education, vegetarianism, the "proteanismo", the "plasmogenia", allies to combat anti-clerical and radical pacifism. From the articles published by the Brazilian Maria Laceda de Moura. in this journal between the years 1930 and 1936, we will seek to demonstrate the constitution of knowledges and a "radical science," critique of current society and toward the construction of a new ethics, of a new harmonious society through cooperation, education, empowerment, technological advances and direct democratic participation. In Estudios magazine, Maria Lacerda de Moura built Ibero- American bridges in order to combat enemies in common and disable any mechanisms of domination. In this way, from local and daily resistance, the construction of a unicist philosophy of nature is evident.