“SEDENTARY” WOMEN AND “COQUETTES” AT THE MARGIN: deviating feminineness in Renato Kehl’s works

Abstract

The present text discusses about women marginalized by the normative and disciplinary discourse by Renato Kehl, one of the most important Brazilian eugenists. Among his works, we cut out the period between 1917 and 1929 to investigate how the image of deviating bodies and feminineness, together with the physical education image, is conceived. Referred to as “sedentary” and “coquettes”, Kehl uses their bodies attributing to them notions of impurity, indolence, and ugliness. In counterpart to the coquette’s artifices and the sedentary woman’s laziness, the eugenic woman should cultivate the honest beauty by performing gymnastic exercises – her beauty should be “natural” and hygienic. Health, honesty, robustness, and beauty are attributes that have become central with the marginalization of deviating feminineness.