Unicamp Center was selected from a collection that brings together letters from scientist and activist Bertha Lutz
The Unicamp Memory Center (CMU) received the certificate of registration of part of its collection in the National Registry of the UNESCO Memory of the World Program – MoWBrasil. A nomination is recognition as a heritage of humanity of documents, archives and libraries of great international, regional and national value. The MoWBrasil notice selected ten out of 29 applications presented, one of the winners being Feminism, science and politics – the Bertha Lutz legacy, 1881-1985. In addition to the CMU, the collegiate candidacy brings together documentation from the National Archives, the Itamaraty Historical Archive and the Documentation and Information Center of the Chamber of Deputies.
The Unicamp part refers to correspondence from Bertha Lutz – biologist and researcher at the National Museum, lawyer, federal servant and activist for female emancipation – to Adolpho Affonso da Silva Gordo, a senator with a prominent role on the national political scene, during the 1920s. 12. The certificate delivery ceremony took place on December 2018, XNUMX, at the Instituto Histórico e Cultural da Aeronáutica (Incaer), in Rio de Janeiro.
André Paulilo, professor at the Faculty of Education (FE) and director of CMU, explains that Memória do Mundo is a UNESCO initiative to publicize and protect heritage of recognized regional, national and international value. “In our case, we were awarded a nomination by the National Committee of the UN body. We have a set of documents about Adolfo Gordo and, within this set, his correspondence, then a senator, with Bertha Lutz, during the campaign for women's suffrage. It is in this documentary context that we participate in the collective candidacy.”
Social scientist Maria Sílvia Duarte Hadler, a researcher at CMU, says that the Memory of the World program emerged from discussions about heritage, memory and preservation in the context of the wars in the Balkan Peninsula (former Yugoslavia), in which many historical and cultural heritages were being destroyed. “It was a context that strengthened the discussion about the importance of memory and the need to preserve different supports related to different forms of culturally significant heritage for humanity. With the dissemination of the initiative by UNESCO, there are now national Memory of the World committees in many countries, such as in Brazil since the beginning of the 2000s.”
The MoWBrasil website details that the program was created by the director general of UNESCO, Frederico Mayor Zaragoza, concerned about the effects of the destruction of the Sarajevo Library, in 1992, during the Bosnian War: (...) “the destruction of around two million books, periodicals and documents, many of them rare or unique, representing an incalculable loss of value. The perception that the majority of people's memory is contained in bibliographic and archival documents that are physically fragile and at constant risk from natural disasters, inadequate custody, robberies and wars required responses that ensured the identification of these collections, their preservation and public access.”
The proposal for this winning candidacy was from the National Archives, which holds a huge collection on Bertha Lutz and invited other institutions that kept documents on the biologist and political activist. The documentation gathered represents the trajectory of one of the leaders of the feminist movement in the first half of the 20th century, as well as the researcher at the National Museum, lawyer and federal public servant at a time when few women worked in administration. Her political trajectory is intertwined with the history of the movement for female suffrage in Brazil.
Inserted in this context, explains Maria Sílvia Hadler, the documents belonging to the Adolpho Affonso da Silva Gordo set, presented by the CMU, portray this period through the correspondence exchanged between the senator and Bertha Lutz. Defender of the suffragist cause, the politician supported the extension of the right to vote to women in the Senate Justice Committee. “Adolpho Gordo’s collection has more than five thousand items – including books, periodicals, manuscripts – and is the subject of a project aimed at digitizing it, sponsored by ProAC [Cultural Action Program] of the Department of Culture and Creative Economy of the State of São Paulo.”
The CMU researcher is of the opinion that Adolpho Gordo's involvement with the issue of women's rights occurred somewhat casually, as a senator of the First Republic with an important role and many relationships with the families that dominated the political scene at the time. “In the case of Bertha Lutz, she received correspondence signed by herself or by the Federation for Women's Progress, which she created. He was a parliamentarian who fought hard in the Senate to promote discussions and then legislation on female suffrage created in the early 30s.”
According to director André Paulilo, the other important profile of Bertha Lutz is the scientist who worked as a biologist at the National Museum – an important part of her research, mainly with amphibians, ended up being lost in the fire of tragic proportions, in September last year. “The 20s and 30s, for a woman, were a time of pioneering the scientific field. And, in parallel, there was political activism, with a campaign for female suffrage that ended victoriously on February 24, 1932, through Decree No. 21.076.”
Paulilo recalls that the restrictions of this legislation on female voting, which authorized single women and widows to vote only if they had income, while married women needed their husbands' approval to exercise this right, were eliminated in 1934. “Bertha Lutz herself She was a candidate of the Independent Electoral League, in 1933, for a place in the National Constituent Assembly of 1934, for the Autonomist Party of the Federal District. Part of this story is preserved in the correspondence between Bertha Lutz and Adolpho Gordo.”
Maria Sílvia remembers that Bertha Lutz advocated many causes regarding female emancipation, including the discussion on divorce, already in vogue in the 20s, although it was not implemented. “The female vote was an extremely important flag, and not just hers, as previously there was already a movement for the recognition of women’s political right to vote”, says the researcher. The right to vote for women was approved in 1932, but would only be practiced after the end of the Estado Novo in 1945.
Recognition
In André Paulilo's opinion, national registration in the Memória do Mundo program is a recognition of the quality of the work involved in processing documentation about Bertha Lutz. “It seems to me that the invitation for the collegiate candidacy also came due to the organization and treatment of this material. Another important aspect of the award is to bring responsibility for the dissemination and accessibility of the collection, making it available to anyone from anywhere in the world who is interested in the topic. The recognition of Memória do Mundo contributes to structuring strategies in this sense.”
The project financed by ProAC to organize Adolpho Gordo's collection should result in its complete digitization by June this year, including Bertha Lutz's letters. Researcher Maria Sílvia Hadler says, by the way, that the 9th National Seminar of the Unicamp Memory Center is being organized, between July 29th and August 1st, with one of the activities being the 1st Colloquium on Cultural Heritage Management, with tables -rounds on themes embedded in Adolpho Gordo’s collection.