Mastering Natural Knowledge in the Portuguese Empire: Transforming Bodies, Exploring Nature, Governing Space

Quite unlike other European empires, Portugal’s was marked by the persistence of a manuscript culture well into the age of print, by the decentralization of its imperial investigative institutions, and by colonial medical challenges that gave metropolitan physicians particular influence over imperial political and economic affairs. This panel explores these dimensions of Portugal’s empire and their consequences for medicine and natural history at the height of European colonialism. The focus on disparate scientific protagonists, chronologies, and colonial spaces, allows each paper to explore how natural knowledge came to be perceived as a solution to the difficult problem of colonial government at a time of fierce inter-imperial competition – from the 1750’s to the early twentieth century. If it was unquestionable to naturalists, physicians, as well as to both colonial and metropolitan administrators that the effective government of empire entailed reaping the formidable natural fecundity of Portuguese colonies, this goal remained enduringly elusive. Through an examination of visual and material culture, natural and anthropological collections, labor regimes and power structures, this panel reflects on the importance of natural landscape, built space, travel, and material circulations for the production of knowledge. Rather than choosing between object-centered or human-centered histories, we consider the crucial role of both subjects and objects to knowledge making in the context of Portugal’s imperial desiderata. From the Brazilian sertão, to the Angolan hinterlands , São Tomé’s cocoa plantations, and the Lisbon National Museum, we explore how natural knowledge was concomitantly used to transform bodies, explore nature, and govern space.