Objetivo/contexto: Muy difundidos en Europa, los debates ilustrados acerca de la influencia del clima sobre los seres conllevan un discurso de género que cuestionaba la virilidad de aquellos hombres europeos nacidos y criados en el continente americano, al mismo tiempo que reducía a los indígenas americanos a una condición infantil. Keywords: Enlightenment, Gender Studies, history of science, Natural History, Peru. Methodology: Looking primarily at natural history produced in Europe, the reactions in the Peruvian Enlightenment press, but also public debate and further knowledge produced in Peru, this research analyzes scientific discourses from a gender perspective centered on masculinities.Ĭonclusions: Based on Connell’s masculinity theory, this article demonstrates that the extensive scientific knowledge produced by the Mercurio Peruano, praising the benefits of the land for Peruvian manhood, promoted a new form of industrious fatherhood-centered masculinity. Originality: This article explores the gendered dimension of European and American scientific discussions on climatic determinism, researching a particular case: the knowledge produced by the contributors to the Mercurio Peruano ( mercuristas), dismissing European misrepresentations that claimed Peruvian men lacked virile features. This was due to the broader discussion on the sources of effeminacy and feebleness among Limeño men of which this scientific debate was a part.
These scientific discussions, which circulated throughout the American continent, had a particular resonance in Lima’s Enlightenment newspaper the Mercurio Peruano. Objective/context: The European Enlightenment debates on the influence of climate over a region’s inhabitants created a gendered discourse that questioned the virility of European men born and raised in the Americas, while at the same time reducing American indigenous men to a state of infancy.
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