INSTITUTO DE FILOSOFIA E CIÊNCIAS SOCIAIS (IFCS – UFRJ)
Address: Largo de São Francisco de Paulo, 1, Centro, Rio de Janeiro, RJ
Themes: Universities and the Student Movement; Political-cultural Resistance and Memory
Translated from the Portuguese by Lara Norgaard
The Federal University of Rio de Janeiro’s Institute of Philosophy and Social Science (IFCS-UFRJ) is an international reference for academic research in the human sciences. The institute is located in an historic building in São Francisco de Paula Square and formed from reforms in higher education that took place in the late 1960s. In 2015, the building held the departments of sociology, anthropology, philosophy, and political science (all parts of the IFCS), in addition to the Institute of History (which separated from the IFCS in 2010). During the military dictatorship, the IFCS was one of the key spaces for the student movement in Rio de Janeiro. It was marked by active political participation of academic centers and regular strikes on the one hand and, on the other, violent repression that the regime lodged against students and professors, who were persecuted, thrown out of the university, taken prisoner, tortured, or killed by the State.
IFCS building.
Source: Coletivo Fotoexpandida/Felipe Nin. Used with permission.
IFCS building.
Source: Coletivo Fotoexpandida/Felipe Nin. Used with permission.
The IFCS was founded in 1968 after the dictatorship disbanded the National Faculty of Philosophy (FNFI). At the time, it was known as the Social Science Institute and was located on Marquês de Olinda Street in the Botafogo neighborhood. Many students and professors from the defunct FNFI were transferred to the Institute. Later, in 1969, it took on its present name and moved to the São Francisco de Paula Square in the city center, where it functions to this day.
In 1968, a terrorist attack caused a bomb to explode in the IFCS. Even though the source of the attack remains unknown, it is associated with the Command for Hunting Communists (CCC), since the group also attacked the University of São Paulo (USP) Faculty of Philosophy at a similar time.
The Institute inspired fear in the extreme right during this period, which motivated the attack. Academic centers were highly active and student strikes, constant. The centers organized assemblies and lectures that discussed issues including: university reform, land reform, and cutbacks in universities. They distributed pamphlets that explicitly criticized the country’s political situation. Moreover, some professors incentivized these student activities and organized their own events on similar topics. One such event was a lecture that a professor of American history, Eutália M. L. Lobo coordinated on the topic “Current Problems in Latin America.” Later, that same professor would be forcibly retired and would spend a week in prison in 1969.
As was common on other UFRJ campuses and in other universities, plainclothes state agents, disguised as students, installed themselves in the IFCS to monitor the activities of both students and professors. Consequently, professors’ freedom to organize and plan their classes was curtailed. Assigning readings by authors with Marxist affiliations or ties to the Brazilian left was enough to get the professor in trouble with the police. In the case of students, many disappeared and were tortured because of allegations made by supposed peers.
When law-decree 477 passed in February 1969, the regime started purging professors accused of subversive activities from public universities. The IFCS professors affected include Guy de Holanda, Eulália Maria L. Lobo, Maria Yeda Linhares, and Manoel Maurício de Albuquerque. Those that managed to stay were investigated up until the 1980s. They included Francisco Falcon and José Luiz Werneck. The sociology professor Lincoln Bicalho Roque, an activist in the Communist Party of Brazil (PCdoB) who was forced to retire in 1969, was killed in an attack carried out by Brazilian state agents.
Police return to the streets of the State of Guanabara during a general strike at the University, but there are no clashes or marches.
Source: Arquivo Nacional, Fundo: Correio da Manhã. Used with permission.
Plaque in homage to students and professors killed during the military dictatorship.
Source: Coletivo Fotoexpandida/Felipe Nin. Used with permission.
The IFCS departments were devastated in terms of quality of education, since there was not enough faculty to replace those who had been forced to leave. As the public push for Amnesty grew after 1979, professors were allowed to return to the IFCS.
The IFCS students who were killed or disappeared for political reasons during the military dictatorship include Kleber Lemos da Silva, Luís Alberto Andrade de Sá e Benevides, Maria Célia Correa, and Adriano Fonseca Filho (we could also include Lincoln Bicalho Roque who, before coming a professor, was a student at FNFI).
In 2015, the IFCS was still a center when students met to discuss political topics. It was the gathering point for protests and the location for public lectures and assemblies. During the June 2013 demonstrations, the IFCS served as a space of refuge for protesters escaping police brutality and the São Francisco de Paula Square in front of the Institute held a lecture with more than 3,000 participants that would decide on the focus and organization of new protests.
Professors and students defended their convictions during a grave moment in Brazilian history. Today, the IFCS keeps the memory of these individuals alive. Those who have not given up the belief that they can change the world still see this space as a place where discussing the future is possible.