History Professor named Larson Fellow

Manuella Meyer, assistant professor of history, has been appointed a Larson Fellow in the John W. Kluge Center of the Library of Congress.

The fellowship will support Meyer’s continued research for her forthcoming book, National Melancholia: Madness, State, and Society in Rio de Janeiro, 1808 - 1940. The book will investigate how groups such as Catholic church authorities, spiritist mediums, candomblé healers, psychiatrists and the mentally ill understood and managed insanity in Brazil.

During the fellowship period, Meyer will conduct archival research at the Library of Congress and the National Library of Medicine to explore how Brazilian spiritists and psychoanalysts defined the borders and circumstances of madness.

The David B. Larson Fellowship in Health and Spirituality is named in honor of the late founder of the International Center for the Integration of Health and Spirituality. The fellowship offers a scholar an opportunity to conduct research on the impact of religion and spirituality on physical, mental, and social health.

Meyer has taught as the University of Richmond since 2009, after completing master and doctoral degrees at Yale.