Primary school bathrooms as hybrid technologies: materials, objects and practices (Buenos Aires, 1880-1930)

ABSTRACT

This article aims to share part of some middle-term research focused on Argentinian school bathrooms. Bathrooms in Argentina emerged around 1850 and have been present – with nuances – in public and domestic buildings since the last third of the nineteenth century. Particularly, primary-school bathroom history is marked by two facts. First, these spaces are closely related to central schooling topics such as behaviours, privacy, intimacy, as well as gender and generational roles. Second, architectural and engineering developments and the proliferation of bathrooms were contemporary processes. The goal here is to trace some relationships between school spaces, materials, objects, and practices present in school bathrooms in the city of Buenos Aires between 1880 and 1930. The focus will be on school bathrooms, but it is also worth mentioning some connections with broader networks such as sanitary bureaucracy and transnational commercial circuits. As a general method, we pursued the Grounded Theory proposal. We worked with several sources: National Council of Education (CNE) files, construction and sanitary regulations, the Sanitary Ministry memories and documents. Due to our interest in objects (for example, sanitary artefacts) and materials, we took in commercial catalogues, a sanitary workers’ journal and archaeological works. First, we will briefly describe some features of the “latrine model”. Then, we would like to discuss the mutation to a more industrialised model, which is the one that persists to this day.

KEYWORDS:

• Bathroom
• school architecture
• material culture

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

¹ Bruno Latour, Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network-Theory (Oxford: OUP, 2007), 18.

² Bandos were rules sanctioned by the colonial government of Río de la Plata.

³ Que por las cañerías que salen á las Calles por bajo de las Calzadas no se viertan aguas inmundas, por lo que perjudican á la salud pública llenando la Calle de mal olor y de insectos; no teniendo otro objeto estos conductos que el desagüe de las lluvias y de alguna otra agua, que aunque proceda del servicio de la Casa, sea de oficinas limpias de motivos inmundos, bajo la pena expresada. Facultad de Filosofía y Letras. UBA, Documentos Para La Historia Argentina. Tomo IX: Administración Edilicia de La Ciudad de Buenos Aires (1776-1805) (Buenos Aires: Compañía Sud Americana de Billetes de Banco, 1918), 35.

⁴ “Tercero: que no se echen basuras ni animales muertos en las calles, plazas y paseos públicos, ni se arrojen aguas inmundas por los albañales, de que resultan lodos permanentes en ellos.” Gobierno de la Nación, “Medidas Generales de Policía Municipal,” 103 § (1810), 63.

⁵ Argentina Buenos Aires, “Registro Oficial de La República Argentina Que Comprende Los Documentos Espedidos Desde 1810 Hasta 1873” (Buenos Aires: La República, 1873).

⁶ It is fundamental to underline the relevance that the nineteenth-century epidemics had in Argentine territory. In relation to this topic, it is worth consulting Diego Armus, “El Descubrimiento de La Enfermedad Como Problema Social,” El Progreso, La Modernización y Sus Límites (1880-1916) (2000): 508–49 about diseases “as social problems,” and Fiquepron, “Los Vecinos de Buenos Aires Ante Las Epidemias de Cólera y Fiebre Amarilla (1856-1886)” about relationships between local government and health policy in 1800 Buenos Aires.

⁷ The Mercado del Plata was the first market in the city of Buenos Aires. Located in the current centre of the city, on what is now 9 de Julio Av., it was founded in 1856.

⁸ Municipalidad de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires, “Reglamento Para El Mercado Del Plata” (1856), 78.

⁹ Municipalidad de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires, “Ordenanza Prescribiendo La Construcción de Sumideros y Otras Medidas de Higiene Pública” (1857).

¹⁰ We use the term “latrines” in this text because it is the name that was used in most documents. Other names were “WW.CC,” “commons”.

¹¹ It is important to highlight that school buildings were mentioned in a city ordinance of 1879 (Municipalidad de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires, “Cómodos” (1879)). Nevertheless, they appeared as specific buildings for the first time in the constructive regulation of 1942.“Ordenanza N^o 14089” (1942).

¹² Pedro Mallo, Lecciones de Higiene Privada y Pública. (Buenos Aires: Facultad de Medicina de Buenos Aires. Imprenta de la Tribuna, 1878). 14–16.

¹³ Benjamin Zorrilla, Educación Común En La Capital, Provincias, y Territorios Nacionales. Año 1889-90-91 (Buenos Aires: Compañía Sudamericana de billetes de banco, 1892).

¹⁴ Zorrilla, Educación Común En La Capital, Provincias, y Territorios Nacionales. Año 1889-90-91, 81.

¹⁵ Inés Dussel, “The Pedagogy of Latrines. A Kaleidoscopic Look at the History of School Bathrooms in Argentina, 1880-1930,” Oxford Review of Education 47, no. 5 (2021): 576–96.

¹⁶ Fabio Pruneri, “Civilisation and the Italian School Toilet: Insights for the Cultural History of Education,” Paedagogica Historica 57, no. 1-2 (2021): 23–38.

¹⁷ Michel Foucault, Nietzsche, La Genealogía, La Historia (Valencia: Pre-textos, 1988).

¹⁸ Latour, Reassembling the Social; and Bruno Latour, We Have Never Been Modern (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2012).

¹⁹ Along the period in study, this office received different designations. We choose to use here “Sanitary Ministry” as a general term.

²⁰ Anselm Strauss and Juliet M. Corbin, Grounded Theory in Practice (Thousand Oaks: Sage, 1997).

²¹ Barbara Penner, Bathroom (London: Reaktion Books, 2013).

²² Penner, Bathroom, 13.

²³ Latour, We Have Never Been Modern; and Latour, Reassembling the Social.

²⁴ Graciela Favelukes and Fernando Aliata, “Medir La Ciudad: Plano Topográfico y Catastro En Buenos Aires (1852-1873),” Estudios Del Hábitat 13, no. 2 (2015): 26–41.

²⁵ Municipal de Buenos Aires, “Reglamento Para Las Casas de Inquilinato, Conventillos y Bodegones” (1871), 117–9.

²⁶ CNE File 2524/10, 1910.

²⁷ CNE File 2397/88, 1888; CNE File 1794/89, 1889; CNE File 0535/98, 1898.

²⁸ Daniel Schavelzon, “Los Baños Del Caserón de Rosas En Palermo: Nuevos Hallazgos (2013-2014),” Conicet Digital, 2014.

²⁹ Schavelzon, “Los Baños Del Caserón de Rosas En Palermo”; Daniel Schavelzon, “Arqueología e Historia Del Hotel Bolívar, Buenos Aires,” 2022.

³⁰ CNE File 2524/1910.

³¹ Adrián Gorelik, “Ciudad, Modernidad, Modernización,” Universitas Humanística 56 (2003): 11–27.

³² Obras Sanitarias de la Nación, Memorias Del Directorio Correspondientes a Los Años 1898 y 1899 (Obras Sanitarias de la Nación, 1890).

³³ Gorelik, “Ciudad, Modernidad, Modernización”; Francisco Liernur, “Una Ciudad Efímera. Consideraciones Sobre Las Características Materiales de Buenos Aires En La Segundo Mitad Del Siglo XIX,” Estudios Sociales 2 (1993): 123–31.

³⁴ Gorelik, “Ciudad, Modernidad, Modernización.”

³⁵ Ibid.

³⁶ Liernur, “Una Ciudad Efímera.”

³⁷ Inés Dussel, “El Patio Escolar, de Claustro a Aula al Aire Libre. Historia de La Transformación de Los Espacios Escolares (Argentina, 1850-1920),” Historia de La Educación-Anuario 20, no. 1 (2019): 1–10.

³⁸ Antonio Viñao Frago, “Escolarización, Edificios y Espacios Escolares,” Participación Educativa, 2008.

³⁹ For an extended work about back yards, see Dussel, ”El Patio Escolar, de Claustro a Aula al Aire Libre. Historia de La Transformación de Los Espacios Escolares (Argentina, 1850-1920).”

⁴⁰ CNE file 5006/96; CNE file 5262/96; CNE file 0416/98; 1726/99.

⁴¹ CNE File, 5009/99, 1899.

⁴² J. De La Salle, Obras Completas de San Juan Bautista de La Salle (Tomos I y II) (Madrid: Ediciones San Pío X, 2001).

⁴³ The edition consulted is written in Spanish. There is used the word “encargado,” that we translate here as “monitor”. However, it is important to express that we do not know the term used by Lasalle, since we have no access to the original.

⁴⁴ Zorrilla, Educación Común En La Capital, Provincias, y Territorios Nacionales. Año 1889-90-91.

⁴⁵ Michel Foucault, Vigilar y Castigar: Nacimiento de La Prisión (Buenos Aires: Siglo xxi, 2000); Inés Dussel and Marcelo Caruso, La Invención Del Aula: Una Genealogía de Las Formas de Enseñar (Buenos Aires: Santillana, 2003).

⁴⁶ Pablo Scharagrodsky, Laura Manolakis, and Rosana Barroso, “La Educación Física Argentina En Los Manuales y Textos Escolares (1880-1930). Sobre Los Ejercicios Físicos o Acerca de Cómo Configurar Cuerpos Útiles, Productivos, Obedientes, Dóciles, Sanos y Racionales,” Revista Brasileira de História Da Educação 3, no. 1 [5] (2003): 69–91.

⁴⁷ Zorrilla, Educación Común En La Capital, Provincias, y Territorios Nacionales. Año 1889-90-91, 75.

⁴⁸ Pedro Mallo, Lecciones de Higiene Privada y Pública Dadas En La Facultad de Medicina de Buenos Aires (Buenos Aires: Imprenta de la Tribuna, 1878), 212.

⁴⁹ Comisión de aguas corrientes, cloacas y adoquinado, Memoria de La Comisión de Aguas Corrientes, Cloacas y Adoquinado Correspondiente al Año 1879 (Imprenta de la penitenciaría, 1880), 11.

⁵⁰ See note 22 above.

⁵¹ CNE File 0445/85, 1885.

⁵² The information about contractors was not a goal of this research. However, we could gain access to some names: Lavalle y Muñiz, Juan Baggio y Cía, Newman, Médici and Cía., Antonio Devoto, Samuel Hale and Cía. and Heinlein and Cia. Some documents affirm that Heinlein was Argentina’s first sanitary artefacts provider. On the other hand, an interesting source about these workers, “los sanitaristas,” is the association’s magazine established in 1919.

⁵³ By 1888 the works had not been completed, but the resources had already been spent. The government decided to sign a lease contract (privatise) for the running water service. The lessee (The Buenos Aires Water Company) promised to finish the works and in exchange was allowed to usufruct the water, sewage, and drainage services for a period of 39 years (a fee of 6 pesos per month for each house or place).

⁵⁴ CNE File 1932/91, 1891.

⁵⁵ CNE File 1980/96, 1896.

⁵⁶ Pedro Mallo was an Argentine doctor and professor of Hygiene at the School of Medicine of the University of Buenos Aires (a position that had been previously held by Guillermo Rawson). He published the book Lecciones de Higiene pública y privada with the transcriptions of the classes. The text constitutes a valuable source since it allows one to know an important part of the curriculum of the Medicine career, and appreciation for the nineteenth-century notion of “hygiene”. We focus on some peculiarities of the Argentine hygienist discourse that allow inferences about certain practices and artefacts. Although texts of this type will not be studied extensively here, they are useful to know certain aspects that the formalism of the legislation or the familiarity of the files does not allow.

⁵⁷ Mallo, Lecciones de Higiene Privada y Pública Dadas En La Facultad de Medicina de Buenos Aires.

⁵⁸ CNE File 13450, 1908.

⁵⁹ CNE File 4268/82, 1882.

⁶⁰ See note 34 above.

⁶¹ There was an office named “Oficina de Constraste” that oversaw the evaluation and approval of the sanitary artefacts. Unfortunately, the register of this office was not preserved, nor was it possible to find the inspection forms.

⁶² Penner, Bathroom, 45.

⁶³ Ibid., 81.

⁶⁴ Obras Sanitarias de la Nación, Memorias Del Directorio Correspondientes a Los Años 1898 y 1899, 8.

⁶⁵ Ibid., 9.

⁶⁶ Antonio Paitoví, Normas Británicas. Especificaciones Varias Del British Engineering Standards Committee, 1918.

⁶⁷ Teresa Chiurazzi, “Lo Común de La Escuela. A Propósito de La Necesidad de Pensar Lo Común y Sus Efectos En La Arquitectura Escolar,” 2021.

⁶⁸ Lauren Berlant, “The Commons: Infrastructures for Troubling Times,” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 34, no. 3 (2016): 393–419.

⁶⁹ Inés Dussel, “Una Escuela Para Lo Común. Notas de Lectura Para Nuevas Cartografías,” in Hacia Una Escuela Para Lo Común: Debates, Luchas y Propuestas (Madrid: Ediciones Morata, 2021), 131–46.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by: (1) CONICET under a Postdoctoral Grant; (2) research project “Espacialidades en la escuela secundaria: corporalidades, discursos y materialidades en la producción del orden escolar” (C152), Facultad de Ciencias de la Educación (UNCo) (2021–2024); (3) research project “La (re) producción de las desigualdades en la Patagonia Norte. Un abordaje multidimensional,” IPEHCS (2019–2024), financiado por el Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas CONICET.

Notes on contributors

Lucila da Silva

Lucila da Silva is a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Patagonian Institute of Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences (IPEHCS-CONICET-UNCo) and in the University of Comahue (Faculty of Education, UNCo). She obtained her BSc degree in Political Sciences from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) in 2010, a Sp. degree in History of Education and Written Culture in Argentina from the University of Comahue (UNCo) in 2017, and her PhD from the University of Buenos Aires (Faculty of Social Sciences, UBA) in 2021. She has also been an assistant professor in the Department of Political Sciences of UNCo since 2014.

Much of her work has been on studying the history of singular school dispositifs. She has investigated textbooks, educational press and school architecture, among others. Over the last years, she has focused on the analysis of school bathrooms. Her research field articulates history of education, material culture and gender studies. She is also studying public bathrooms regarding contemporary issues, such as gender discrimination. She has published articles in national and international magazines, book chapters and her own book about “sickly children.”