Suzana Herculano-Houzel assumes Otavio Frias Filho Chair – 02/18/2023 – Power

Biologist and neuroscientist Suzana Herculano-Houzel will be the new holder of the Otavio Frias Filho Chair for Studies in Communication, Democracy and Diversity, created by USP’s Institute for Advanced Studies (IEA) in partnership with Sheet.

Herculano-Houzel has been an associate professor at Vanderbilt University, in the United States, since 2016, and a columnist for the newspaper. She is one of the main names in Brazilian neuroscience, with works of international repercussion.

The teacher still has a strong presence in the area of ​​scientific dissemination. She is the author of several books for the lay public, such as “The Human Advantage – How Our Brain Becomes Superpowerful” (Companhia das Letras), and has also hosted a segment on Fantástico, on TV Globo.

“The invitation to the chair not only makes me very honored. It is also the perfect opportunity to explore with the public and specialists topics that interest me as a researcher”, she says.

The new theme of the chair will be “Science, Communication and the Future”. Based on this selection, Herculano-Houzel should set up a cycle of lectures with specialists — and, at the end, help organize a book with articles by selected researchers.

“Science is the engine that provides knowledge to make good decisions. Decisions that keep us flexible. It is also a way of thinking that strives to keep people open-minded. I think that democracies, in all their forms, start with the open access to the information that science generates”, says the new holder of the chair.

The researcher states that the plan is to set up a program that promotes contact between different disciplines.

“The idea is to bring together people with the ability to bring together elements that range from the biological bases of diversity to the consequences of that diversity for human life. What I see in the history of human diversity are elements that cross levels and disciplines. The Chair will be a opportunity to think about these connections.”

For professor André Chaves de Melo, academic coordinator of the chair, Herculano-Houzel represents not only the cutting-edge scientific experience, but also the concern in communicating science to the general public.

“The idea is to have a cycle that discusses diversity, democracy and its relations with science. And, within that, the challenges of science in a society in transformation”, says Melo. “As a neuroscientist, she brings experience working with many challenges in this field. She works with sleep, cognition, lifespan — which are related to economic and social issues.”

Guilherme Ary Plonski, director of the IEA, highlights her experience as a researcher working in two countries, the United States and Brazil, as an asset for the chair.

“She has a vision of these two cultures. They are two countries where the issue of science has been very pronounced in recent years — with Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil and Donald Trump in the United States. Having someone in these two environments, who can look at our reality and the them, it will be extremely enriching.”

With the nomination, Herculano-Houzel succeeds sociologist Muniz Sodré, the first holder of the chair, who is professor emeritus at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) and columnist for Sheet. Sodré, who is one of the main researchers in the area of ​​communication in Brazil, organized the series of lectures “Being Brazilian today: diversity and democracy” — the book with contributions from selected researchers is in preparation.

“It was a fruitful year, with wonderful coexistence”, says Sodré. “We discussed the Brazilian man, what it means to be national. This question has always been an enigma and, for me, it is the great Brazilian social and anthropological question.”

“Each and every identity is a continuous process of constitution. The black, indigenous, women’s identity movement —who are within the sphere of identity— are part of this broad process of national identity. They do not bring fragmentation, but plurality, diversity.”

The chair was launched in February 2021, as part of the celebrations for the 100 years of Sheet. The initiative honors journalist Otavio Frias Filho (1957-2018), who led the modernization project launched by the newspaper in 1984 and directed the newsroom until his death, due to cancer.

“The public notice for the first cycle was for 50 researchers and we had more than 180 join — we accepted everyone in the end”, says André Chaves de Melo.

He assesses that the hybrid format allowed the participation of researchers from all over the country and, therefore, the idea is to repeat the formula. Graduates, postgraduates and those who are studying a postgraduate course can participate in the chair. Applications will be announced shortly.