The construction of health systems in the Iberian Peninsula, between the end of the 18th century and the 20th century, accompanied the consolidation of two liberal regimes in Portugal and Spain, translating into the reinforcement of public health policies, regulatory devices and institutional networks. Municipalities, misericórdias and hospitals assumed a central role, especially in the urban context, where demographic growth and living conditions accentuated inequalities during illness and death.
This workshop proposes an approach integrated into these dynamics, articulating public health, institutions and social inequalities, with a special focus on the city as a privileged observation space. Topics such as epidemics, childhood, motherhood and mortality patterns will be discussed, as well as the evolution of sources and methods, from 19th-century medical classifications to contemporary quantitative and digital approaches..
It also constitutes a space for intergenerational dialogue, bringing together students and senior researchers of recognized international prestige, promoting critical discussion and circulation of methodologies and analytical perspectives.

 

PROGRAMME:

May 28

• 9.30 am – Alexandra Esteves (Lab2PT-Univ. of Minho) – Opening
• 9.45 am – Paulo Matos & Diogo Paiva (CIES-ISCTE-IUL) – Health and inequalities in the city of Porto, 1869-1950
• 10 am – Antero Ferreira (Casa de Sarmento/Univ. Minho) – The National Geneological Repository and its potential for health history
  10.15 am – Keynote Lecture

Moderation by Antero Ferreira (Casa de Sarmento/Univ. of Minho)
Diego Ramiro-Fariñas (CSIC-Madrid) The project to reconstruct the history of the population of Madrid: twenty years since the creation of the Historical Longitudinal Registry of the city of Madrid.

• 11.30 am-1 pm – Panel 1 – City and disease: institutional responses (19th–20th centuries)

Moderation: Maria Norberta Amorim

• • Célia Oliveira (Lab2PT-University of Minho) – The Santo António Hospital in times of epidemics: vulnerability and resilience in nineteenth-century Porto (1850–1900)
  • Maria João Pires (Lab2PT –University of Minho) – The São João Hospital and the city of Porto in the Estado Novo: between healing, knowledge production and urban transformation
  • Alexandra Esteves (Lab2PT-Univ. of Minho) and Tânia Ferreira (Lab2PT –University of Minho) – The 1957 Asian Flu in Portugal: Impacts, Responses and Representations
  • Yolanda Casado (University of Valladolid) – The Municipal Hygiene Laboratory of Madrid and the construction of urban public health (1880–1930)

 

• 2.30 pm – 4 pm- Panel 2 — Public health, childhood and assistance

Moderation: Paulo Teodoro de Matos (CIES-ISCTE-IUL)

• • Lara Moreira (University of Minho) – Between Adherence and Resistance: Social and Political Perceptions of Smallpox Vaccination in Portugal in the 19th and 20th Centuries
  • Lara Cunha (University of Minho) – Childhood in a Context of Deprivation: The Braga Creche-Hospice as a Welfare Response (1936–1956)
  • Marta Veloso (University of Minho): Infant Nutrition from a Medical Perspective in Portugal in the First Decade of the 20th Century.

 

May 29

• 9.30 am – 11 am – Panel 3 — Motherhood, illness, and urban inequalities

Moderation: Diogo Paiva (CIES-ISCTE-IUL)

• • Inês Carrilho (CIES-ISCTE-IUL) – Maternal Mortality in the second half of the 19th century: data from an ongoing investigation
  • Paulo Teodoro de Matos (CIES-ISCTE-IUL) – Tuberculosis and inequalities in the city of Porto (1869–1890)
  • Thassio Ferraz (Oswaldo Cruz Foundation) – Mapping the disease: a study based on parish and administrative sources between Brazil and Portugal (18th century)
• 11.30 am-1 pm – Panel 4 — Mortality Patterns

Moderation: Alexandra Esteves (Lab2PT-Univ. of Minho)

• • Nicole Borginho (IMT/Nova) – Infant mortality in a spatial perspective: Paranhos e S. Nicolau in the second half of the 19th century
  • Ricardo Barrau (CIES-ISCTE-IUL) – Padrões Sazonais da Mortality in the 19th century: Historical Evidence from Death Records
  • Isabel Tiago de Oliveira (CIES-ISCTE-IUL) – Locals and foreigners facing death in the city of Porto at the end of the nineteenth century.

 

• 2.30 pm – 4 pm — Panel 5 — Between nosographies and algorithms: sources and methods for the study of mortality.

Moderation: Diego Ramiro Fariñas (CSIC, Madrid)

• • Diogo Paiva (CIES-ISCTE-IUL) – Colonial Nosographies. Sources for Mortuary Statistics in Overseas Provinces at the End of the 19th Century
  • Dariya Ordanovich (CSIC, Madrid), Francisco Viciana (IECA, Seville), Diego Ramiro Fariñas (CSIC, Madrid) – Developing Scalable and Standardized AI Tools for Record-Based Management Data Collection, Organization, and Analysis
  • Antero Ferreira (Casa de Sarmento – Univ. of Minho) – Diagnostic Expressions and Causes of Death in Portugal in the 19th Century
• 4.15 pm – 5 pm – Closing Conference

Moderation by Isabel Tiago de Oliveira
Maria Norberta Amorim – From diversity to convergence in current mortality rates in different regions of the country (18th to 20th centuries)

 

Free entry.

 

Image source: here