“Criar cidadãos perfeitos para uma República máscula, forte e virtuosa”: o Primeiro Congresso Nacional Feminista e de Educação em Lisboa (1924) e a modernização da desigualdade

Abstract

Organized by the Conselho Nacional das Mulheres Portuguesas (National Council of Portuguese Women – CNMP), the Primeiro Congresso Feminista e de Educação (First Feminist and Education Congress) took place between the 4th and 9th of May 1924, in Lisbon. On the occasion, some theses were presented and discussed on topics related to political and civic rights, education, social assistance, hygiene, and women's health. Taking advantage of the centenary of this Congress, we propose a historicized analysis of the event, especially some of the theses, which mobilizes reflections on the intrinsic relationships between a certain feminism and a hygienist nation project, focused on improving the race. Without wanting to reduce feminist expressions from the beginning of the 20th century to a rigid definition – even because the conflicts within the CNMP point to various positions regarding the emancipation of the female sex —, we intend to draw attention, as Susan Besse well outlined in the study the Brazilian case, for a “modernization of inequality”. For this historian, marriage, sexuality, motherhood, and female education – themes recurrently present in feminist discussions in the late 19th century and in the first decades of the 20th century – acquired enormous importance, since “clean reproduction” was considered a way to overcome the backwardness and degeneration of certain nations. Our hypothesis is that the institutional feminism represented by the CNMP, by claiming dignity and equality of opportunity for women, found a place in the ingenious project of social reform based on eugenic precepts, supported mainly through medical-anthropological discourse. In this, “the woman” was called upon to carry the heavy burden of civilizing her family, assuming a fundamental role for the State, although conservative: that of wife and mother, educated to manage the home and to create “perfect citizens for a masculine, strong, and virtuous Republic” – words by Julieta Ribeiro, author of the thesis A mulher naturista (The naturist woman).