ABSTRACT
In line with 18th-century Physiocratic thought, agriculture was one of Alexandre Rodrigues Ferreira’s main objects of reflection during his Philosophical Journey (1783-1792), with special emphasis on the text “Estado Presente da Agricultura do Pará” [Present state of agriculture in the Pará], manuscript evaluating how observation and experience supported the political and economic projects implemented in the local and metropolitan spheres. We will analyze the construction of an epistemic genre, the “Present State”, highlighting scientific practices in all complexity, covering the investigations on the journey and the process of writing, reflecting and synthesizing the text. We will highlight the discourses on the decay of agriculture and its reformist proposals for the implementation of agricultural policies, in a civilizing process associating ordering and natural domestication with colonial projects.
KEYWORDS
Philosophical journey; agriculture; History of Science
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