Lights on the body: Antônio Nunes Ribeiro Sanches and the Portuguese medical knowledge in the second half of the XVIII century

• Grant number: 13/23666-4
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: March 01, 2014
• End date: December 31, 2014
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - History - Modern and Contemporary History
• Principal Investigator: Leila Mezan Algranti
• Grantee: Julie Hamacher Liepkaln
• Host Institution: Instituto de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas (IFCH). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This article aims to analyze the transformation in the knowledge about the body, health, and disease on the intellectual production of Medicine, particularly the work of the new Christian physician Antônio Nunes Ribeiro Sanches. Through bibliography and sources, we intend to investigate his trajectory in order to situate him within the context of the Portuguese Enlightenment. Also, examining two treaties of Sanches in more detail, our objective is to understand his ideas concerning the body and how these ideas can engender a proposal, adopted or not by Pombal's reforms. From this analytical proposal, we will verify how medical knowledge is articulated not only with the scientific but also with a specific sociocultural context, in this case, the Portuguese Enlightenment. (AU)