Combining psychiatry and spiritism: Therapies employed in a Brazilian sanatorium (1934–1948).

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to present an historical account of an intersection that occurred in Brazil between popular healing treatments and conventional psychiatric practices during the first half of the 20th century. To illustrate our argument, we analyzed data retrieved from the medical records of patients admitted to the Spiritist Sanatorium of Uberaba, Brazil, between 1934 and 1948. Although the Uberaba Spiritist movement founded the institution, it was directed by a physician educated in the biomedical tradition at the Rio de Janeiro School of Medicine. Based on the theory of the circulation and appropriation of knowledge, we elucidated the adaptations and negotiations that were necessary for the reception and dissemination of the practice of the two different therapeutic methodologies on Brazilian psychiatric soil. (PsycINFO Database Record

Psychotherapy in Europe

“…Researchers have documented how hypnosis, autogenic relaxation techniques, and other psychotherapies based on suggestion, remained popular in both the clinical and popular realms across the Soviet sphere, usually building on traditions that preceded the establishment of Communism in the region, but perhaps benefitting from an ideological climate that privileged approaches which resonated with ‘Pavlov’s teachings’ (Brokman, 2018; Geyer, 2011; Lauterbach, 1984; Marks, 2018). Julia Gyimesi’s and Matthew Drage’s articles, along with those in the parallel special issue on the relationship between therapeutics and spiritism in Brazil and Cuba, and mind cure and mysticism in the United States, remind us that the history of psychotherapy has long been entangled with religious and esoteric beliefs (Fachinetti and Jabert, 2018; Lambe, 2018; Schmidt, 2018).…”

History and the topsy-turvy world of psychotherapy.

“…254–272) shows, psychoanalysis, heavily influenced throughout the 20th century by a succession of French approaches, remained so central to society that rivalries between psychologists and psychiatrists for its control led to university strikes and—in Argentina’s volatile political climate—at one point even to lethal consequences. Cristiana Facchinetti and Alexander Jabert (2018, pp. 208–222) and Jennifer Lambe (2018, pp.…”