The political and historiographic engagement in the profession of Brazilian historians: a reflection on the foundation of contemporary Brazilian historiography (1975-1979)

Abstract

Taking the years of validity of I Plano Nacional de Pós-Graduação (1975-1979), this article analyzes the institutionalization of the type of historiography that until today is defined as professional. The assumption presented suggests that in this period there were a strong trend of engagement of intellectuals in the themes opened up by the re-democratization. This climate general of engagement prompted historians to study what at the time was called “new syndicalism”, which introduced rural and urban workers in the foreground of the interests of academic historiography. The empirical change-over which was the characteristic of neohistoricists theoretical debates that marked the epoch inspired the historians to make case studies characterized by objects rigidly delimited. The academic institutionalization of this change-over interdicted the   essay style, the practice of synthesis and the exercise of medium and long duration diachrony. This situation made it difficult the affirmation of History in the public debate as an applied social science. This explains the almost total absence of historians in the institutions that in the late 1970s intermediated directly the political activism of intellectuals. The main feature of the reflection developed in this article is the complementary tension between an intense historiographic engagement and a shy direct political engagement in in the office of Brazilian historians during the first years of redemocratization.