Social work teaching in Portugal began in 1935 with the opening of the Instituto de Serviço Social, in Lisbon, which was headed until 1944 by a French social worker: Marie-Thérèse Lévêque. Several attempts had been made since the First Republic to establish social workers' training in Portugal, but it was only during the Estado Novo construction phase, with the configuration of a new conjuncture between Church, State and intellectual movements, that it was possible to shape a decisive proposal. This resulted in the convergence of the hygienist movement and some Catholic elites - namely social Catholicism -, with the Estado Novo's political project, in which corporatism emerged as a model.
The PhD research, still underway, assumes the existence of a potential for understanding social work history in Portugal by looking at the biographical journey of Marie-Thérèse Lévêque, in her connection with the Instituto de Serviço Social. This study object is likely to reveal a personal and professional experience that is both rich and historically interesting. The aim is to see how a woman who evolved within the social work under construction in two societies - French and Portuguese - can enlighten us about the plurality of dimensions that crossed social work in Portugal, and point out central issues that marked that period in our country's history (1935-1944), particularly at social and mentality level, taking into account the political contours of that same context.
Lacking an organised collection of documents, in Portugal or abroad, that could provide a historically dense overview from the first decade of teaching at the Instituto de Serviço Social (Lisbon), or about the biographical journey of Marie-Thérèse Lévêque, the research started by collecting oral testimonies from social workers who graduated at that school between 1935 and 1944. The interviews, which were biographical and narrative, became crucial to the research since:
- provided direct historical information about the interviewees' journey at the Instituto de Serviç Social (sociability circles and motivations for entering the school; training programme and respective teachers, among others);
- have given us access to first-hand testimonies, which are an expression of the "memory" that Marie-Thérèse Lévêque left behind in those who were in close contact with her, and which help us to understand her historical relevance;
- allowed us to recreate several networks and circles of sociability in which Marie-Thérèse Lévêque moved between 1901 (the year of her birth) and 1944 (when she left her position as director of the Instituto de Serviço Social and returned to Paris);
- have led to clues about national and foreign organisations that intersected with Marie-Thérèse Lévêque's training and professional career, and with the first ten years of existence of the Instituto de Serviço Social, guiding the researcher towards finding and collecting documentary sources, which until then had been spread across archives in Lisbon, Paris, Brussels, Geneva and London.
| Period | 13 Dec 2012 |
|---|
| Event title | História Oral Portuguesa em Rede (1.º Encontro) |
|---|
| Event type | Conference |
|---|
| Location | Lisboa, PortugalShow on map |
|---|
- Social work history
- Social history
- Oral history
- Estado Novo
- Instituto de Serviço Social
- Marie-Thérèse Cécile Lévêque
