Dr. Manuella Meyer

Assistant Professor of History

My current project examines the socio-political and medical terrain in which mental illness became a public health construct and its subsequent management in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. I explore the extent to which the gradual adoption of punitive views of insanity helped legitimize social and gender inequalities. By using an array of sources such as asylum records, medical journals, government documents, travel logs, and newspapers, I draw on works propelling socio-political and cultural discursive analysis that lie in the intersections of history, political theory, anthropology and public health. 

Teaching:
Colonial and Modern Latin America
History of Brazil
Afro-Latin America
Atlantic World

Research:
Political and Cultural History of Latin America
Welfare and Philanthropy in Latin America
Sociology of Medical Knowledge

Education:
M.A., Ph.D., Yale University
B.A., Brown University