The present study is the research object of José Verissimo´s (Brazil), and José Ingenieros´s
(Argentina) thought on race and education. The proposal is to conduct a comparative study
among the authors of this thought. Problematized as a central issue the following question:
How does José Verissimo´s and José Ingenieros´s thought articulate the relationship between
race and education in Latin America of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century?
General objective was defined: through the compared study Jose Verissimo´s and José
Ingenieros´s thought on education, highlighting their interaction with the concept of race in
nineteenth -century in Latin America. The specific objectives intended to: 1) highlight the
historical context of educational thought of Jose Verissimo and José Ingenieros, 2) identify
the work of these authors, the relationship between race and education, and to relate the Jose
Verissimo´s and José Ingenieros´s thought on race and education in the history of Latin
American intellectual thought . Methodologically, the study falls in the field of intellectual
and cultural history. The research corpus is composed of two works of each author. José
Verissimo, worked with " indigenous and mestizo populations of the Amazon: their language,
their beliefs and customs " (1887) and “National Education” (1906) . Joseph Ingenieiros,
collated up “El hombre mediocre” (1913) and “Las fuerças morales “(posthumous). The
results, are still very preliminary studies, indicate that how the theories of race arrives in Latin
America are the key to the authors´understanding. Accordingly, it was necessary to conduct a
brief reflection on the theoretical discussions that the race issue raised in Latin America of the
nineteenth century, as well as Verissimo and Ingenieiros were born and lived most of their
lives in this period. Particularly, Verissimo was born in the far north of Brazil, Pará, and lived
between 1857 and 1916. He devoted himself to the study of Literary Criticism and reflected
on education, placing it as necessary instrumental in raising the mestizo population of the
country to the civilized condition. Specifically, Ingenieiros was born in Palermo, Italy, but
migrated to Argentina as a child and became an Argentine citizen. He devoted himself to the
study of psychiatry, but became involved, in particular the anthropological and
Criminological areas. When discussing mental disorders of individuals in Argentine society,
Ingenieros refers to colonization and the material conditions of the subjects. For him, the end
of the nineteenth century, the inferior races continued to represent an obstacle to the
development of Argentina. The principle identifies that Ingenieiros´s very mediocre man is
very similar to Verissimo´s indolent man. Both states - mediocre and lazy - represented a
backward state not seen in this most civilized man. Thus, external conditions argue for
different lenses, both in Argentina and in Brazil, the internal changes determined by race,
which resulted in mediocre man and indolent, were overcome.
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