Psychiatric Dispositive and Production of Killable Subjects in Brazil between the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries

Authors

  • Silvio de Azevedo Soares Universidade Estadual Paulista Júlio de Mesquita Filho (Unesp)
  • Luís Antônio Francisco de Souza Universidade Estadual Paulista, Unesp, campus de Marília

Keywords:

psychiatry, dispositive, biopower, biopolitics, Homo Sacer

Abstract

From Michel Foucault’s contributions (and his concepts of biopower and dispositive) and Giorgio Agamben (Homo Sacer) it is discussed how deaths were produced by the psychiatry in Brazil of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Through bibliographic review in works dealing with psychiatry in this historical period, the article analyzes, in interpretations of psychiatric discourses and practices, the implication of biological characteristics, aspects of the bare life of individuals and groups, which would turn them into killable subjects, close to the condition of Homo Sacer, and exposed to death within the psychiatric weft.

Author Biographies

Silvio de Azevedo Soares, Universidade Estadual Paulista Júlio de Mesquita Filho (Unesp)

Doutorando do Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ciências Sociais (PPGCS) da Universidade Estadual Paulista Júlio de Mesquita Filho (Unesp, Marília, Brasil) e pesquisador do Observatório de Segurança Pública (OSP) da Unesp. É licenciado em ciências sociais e bacharel em sociologia pela Unesp.

Luís Antônio Francisco de Souza, Universidade Estadual Paulista, Unesp, campus de Marília

Professor livre-docente do Departamento de Sociologia e Antropologia e do PPGCS da Unesp. É doutor e mestre pelo Programa de Pós-Graduação em Sociologia (PPGS) da Universidade de São Paulo (USP, Brasil) e licenciado e bacharel em ciências sociais pela USP.

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Published

2019-09-24

Issue

Vol. 12 No. 3 (2019): SET/OUT/NOV/DEZ

Section

Articles

License

Upon submitting a text, the authors retain copyright and grant DILEMAS - Revista de Estudos de Conflito e Controle Social the right of first publication, with the work simultaneously licensed under the Creative Commons License type attribution BY (CC-BY), which permits sharing of the work with acknowledgment of authorship and initial publication in this journal.