Geographic Institute of Brazil

The Geographic Institute of Brazil appears in the narrative of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea as one of the many prestigious scientific and scholarly organizations drawn into the heated international debate over the identity of the mysterious sea creature that had been terrorizing maritime traffic. During the period when the "monster question inflamed all minds," the Institute was cited among the bodies whose published discussions and feature articles became the target of both serious analysis and popular ridicule. The popular press, with inexhaustible zest, took potshots at the Institute's work alongside that of the Royal Academy of Science in Berlin, the British Association, the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., and other learned societies, as well as at discussions in journals such as The Indian Archipelago, Cosmos, and Petermann's Mittheilungen. This listing places the Geographic Institute of Brazil firmly within the transatlantic network of institutions that attempted to apply scientific reasoning to the phenomenon, only to have their findings lampooned by witty writers in the periodicals. The Institute's involvement, however brief, signals that the mystery was not merely a European or North American concern but a truly global one, drawing in the scholarly community of South America as well. Its mention serves to illustrate the breadth of the controversy and the extent to which the creature had captured the world's imagination, forcing even distant academies to take a public stand on whether the object was a colossal narwhale, an underwater boat, or a figment of collective hysteria.