Corpos em disputa : políticas de controle, mercado e medicalização dos corpos das mulheres na imprensa paraibana (1965-1970)

Abstract

The overpopulation panic, mainly in emerging countries, led to some birth reduction policies being implemented in Brazil in the 1960s, under the title of birth control and family planning policies. Following these policies, some agencies worked to disseminate contraceptive methods and address family planning campaigns for the Brazilian population, in all regions of the country. In this sense, we seek to understand how the press reported these policies and which speeches were published about contraceptive methods, planning policies and the population context of Paraíba from 1965 to 970. We used as a methodology the analysis of newspapers such as A União and Correio da Manhã, which had circulated in Paraíba and Rio de Janeiro, respectively. For this, we rely on the theoretical contribution of the history of women and the history of Paraíba, in order to fill some gaps in the historiography of Paraíba about the press. After analyzing the sources and crossing data with the bibliography, we understand that the press played an important role in forming opinions about contraceptive methods, and also in reproducing eugenic ideas that came from North America and Europe regarding the family planning and birth reduction, although there was no consensus in the press about being in favor or against contraceptive methods.