BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY OF MEXICAN SCIENCE IN THE WORK OF SANTIAGO RAMÍREZ (1836-1922)

Abstract

Santiago Ramírez (1836-1922) was a Mexican mining engineer who elaborated a historical narrative through the biographical genre, and for the first time formulated a corpus of knowledge about the discourse and the scientific practice that was unfolded in Mexico in the 19th Century. His biographical work represents a transition between the classical biography and the new essayistic perspective of stand out the mutual relationships and shared projects in a group of individuals who had opted for the study of Natural History and the Physical sciences. His more than twenty-two essays in this literary genre, while extolling the intellectual attributes of his biographies, represent a new route in Mexican historiography to rethink the being and the making of a group of professionals who "have influenced" and "sustained the scientific march" of Mexican science. In the article it is maintained that his biographical work is clearly located in the Mexican origin of prosopography as a methodological proposal for the study of the history of science and the construction of the intellectual field.