SCHOOL GEOGRAPHY IN THE PROVINCE OF MINAS GERAIS IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY AND THE INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF BRAZILIAN GEOGRAPHY

Resumo

This study aims to understand the history of school geography in the province of Minas Gerais from 1854 to 1889. It analyzes the process of the institutionalization of geography in Minas Gerais and, consequently, in Brazil during the second half of the nineteenth century. The thesis is based on the assumption that the teaching of geography was not confined to the Colégio Pedro II and that its development was not merely a simplification of academic and scientific knowledge. On the contrary, it was a slow process of disciplinarization, in which textbook authors and teachers from primary, normal, and secondary schools played a crucial role. This work also aimed to analyze the purposes of teaching geography beyond the prescriptive realm, in an investigation that combined the analysis of curricular prescriptions with everyday classroom practices. The main sources analyzed, in addition to legislation, included school curricula, educational board reports, tests and exams, meeting minutes and official opinions, all gathered from the Public Archive of Minas Gerais (APM); school textbooks on Geography and Chorography sourced from the Didactic Book Library of the Faculty of Education of the University of São Paulo (BLD/FEUSP), the National Library, the State Library of Minas Gerais, and the Digital Library of the Federal Senate; the Pedro II School Memory Center (NUDOM); and other documents obtained through the Brazilian Schoolbook Database (LIVRES).