O tremor dos sertões: experiências da epidemia de malária no Baixo Jaguaribe-CE (1937-1940)

Abstract

This research aims to understand the sort of experiences lived by the population of “Baixo Jaguaribe” region, state of Ceará, during the epidemics of malaria through 1937 until 1940. The adversities and the cultural permanency and changes the swampy plague brought to the routine of that region were analyzed. Such interferences originate a crisis in the local economy, once the time dedicated to laboring submitted itself to the intervals that the disease’s peak had not appeared. Sometimes the disease reached all the members of one single family, thereupon many crops were lost and also a lot of work to be done in the field (cultivated with carnaubas, cotton) and in the pasture were left behind. Due to the plague, some funeral rituais changed: people did not follow funerals and did not attend to the death-watch, the churches’ bell did not toll to announce deaths in the community and, besides all this, the priests were not able to attend all the moribund requests to “extrema-unção”. The whole set of explications to the process of eradication of the plague were highlighted in this research. Thus, swampy plague was understood beyond its pathologic aspect, referring to it as a component responsible for a complete social disorganization process. Therefore, as the option to study the epidemics of malaria was set, a complex network that embodies feelings as well as experiences lived by the people caught by the plague was found.