Prof. Dr. Luis Rosenfield

Senior Guest Researcher 

Bonn Center for Dependency and Slavery Studies
October 2023

Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS), Brazil
 
Title of current research project: "Brazilian Eugenics: Philosophical Foundations, Intellectual Networks and Institutional Development"
Luis Rosenfield
© Luis Rosenfield

Academic Profile

Brazilian eugenics: philosophical foundations, intellectual networks and institutional development

This project aims to understand the development of Brazilian eugenics  during the 20th century, reconstructing the networks of eugenicist intellectuals and observing the networks of sociability in which they were inserted. Due to the obvious stigma that eugenics carries to this day, naturally because of all the abuse committed in its name, there are still numerous gaps in this system of thought. The aim of this project is, therefore, an effort to interpret, from primary sources – speeches, monographs, articles, conferences, books, technical manuals, doctrines – eugenics as a philosophical-political system of thought in the historical context of Brazil in the first half of the 20th century, while at the same time taking into account the influences of the positivist, evolutionist and scientific theories of the late 19th century.

Luis Rosenfield has a PhD in Law (2019, UNISINOS) and a PhD in Philosophy (2021, PUCRS) and is an Assistant Professor of the History Department and International Relations Department of the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS) in Porto Alegre, Brasil, specializing in the areas of History of Constitutional Thought, History of Law, Intellectual History and History of Ideas.

  • 2021. Revolução conservadora: genealogia do constitucionalismo autoritário brasileiro (1930–1945). Porto Alegre: EDIPUCRS.
  • 2021. "A history of Ideas of Brazilian Authoritarian Constitutionalism." In A democracia: uma urgência educativa, edited by Draiton Gonzaga de Souza, Evandro Pontel, and Jair Tauchen, 77–106. Porto Alegre: Editora Fênix. 
  • 2020. With A . Vespaziani. "Fascismo tropicale, ovvero la recezione della dottrina fascista italiana nel Brasile dell'Estado Novo di Vargas." In La costruzione della legalitá fascista negli anni trenta, edited by Italo Birocchi, Giovanni Chiodi, and Mauro Grondona, 449–461. Roma: RomaTre-Press.