A lymfoterapia ou a cura pelo cuspe: os saberes “médicos” produzidos pelo curandeiro/farmacêutico José Fábio Lyra na Paraíba (1904-1945).

Abstract

This dissertation aims to analyze the "medical" knowledge produced by the healer/pharmacist José Fábio Lyra in Paraíba through the creation of lymphotherapy in the period from 1920 to 1945. José Fábio Lyra composed an antidote for the healing done through saliva, known as the sputum vaccines. The selected time frame contemplates the period of institutionalization of the medical profession in Paraíba, at the same time that a strong persecution was built by the doctors to the method developed by the practitioner. During this period, his main works were also published: "Lymphoterapia (reasons, facts and cures)" and "Lympho- therapy of physio-psychism", thus configuring this cut as the moment of greater dissemination of lympho- therapy. Although the selected geography is Paraíba, we will emphasize two cities: Bananeiras, place of production of the vaccines and Umbuzeiro, through its political action. In the writing of this text, we used the documentary analysis of bibliographical and journalistic sources in circulation at the time, such as the newspapers A União, A Noite, A Voz da Borborema and A Imprensa, from the annals of the Society of Medicine and Surgery of Paraíba; of personal letters from the Lyra family archive and from the works published by José Fábio Lyra. Among the concepts and authors discussed, we highlight Leonardo Querino Barboza Freire dos Santos (2015) to discuss the institutionalization of medical knowledge; Michel Foucault (1979) to understand the relationships and networks of power that involved José Fábio Lyra with people close to him, as well as the concept of bio-politics, to discuss how scientific medicine was configured as a strategy of social control; and, finally, Oscar Oliveira de Castro (1945) to understand the arts of healing and the popular practices in Paraíba. In this way, we seek to understand the performance of the lymphotherapy cure procedures and their contributions to the Paraiba medicine of the time.