Science Represented in Newspapers in the Constitutional Monarchy and the 1st Republic. A Study in Faial Island, the Azores, Portugal

Abstract

This study aims to apprehend the representations of science published in two local newspapers (O Faialense and O Telégrafo) published in the periphery of Portugal (Faial Island, the Azores), in the last quarter of the 19th and early 20th century. For this purpose, the authors carried out a thematic and qualitative analysis of the news collected in these two newspapers. Results allow concluding that, while Positivism is considered one of the main currents of thought justifying the rise of the republican logic, which culminated in the revolution that deposed the constitutional monarchy regime and implemented the republican regime in 1910 in Portugal, the research carried out shows a growing appreciation and visibility of the importance ascribed to both science and technology, without, however, any explicit association with political ideologies. This may be due to the type of search carried out and the editorial lines of the two newspapers, as well as – or also – to their peripheral geographical location concerning the propagation of these ideas.

Received: 31 October 2020 / Accepted: 9 December 2020 / Published: 17 January 2021