The objective of this investigation is to analyze the medical discourses of Nise da Silveira (1905 – 1999), mainly about her understanding of the feminine psychology between the late twenties and the sixties. Silveira graduated in medicine at the Faculty of Bahia, in 1926, presenting as her graduation work an essay on female criminality. In order to address this issue, Silveira moved in her thesis through a range of medical discourses, such as: criminal anthropology, the theory of degeneracy, mental hygiene and psychoanalysis. 
    In the thirties, in Rio de Janeiro, the doctor wrote an article on philosophy and society, adopting a Marxist perspective, talking about themes related to the proletariat and socialist revolution. During this period, the doctor maintained an anti-fascist posture and also pointed to the issue of female emancipation through work, moving away from medical and eugenic discourses that idealized a female normality. 
    From the late 1940s to the 1960s, the physician constructed discourses related to mental health, which involved occupational therapy, schizophrenia, the unconscious and subjectivity, appropriating mainly the theories of Carl Gustav Jung. With regard to female mental illness, Silveira, based on Jung's contributions, built an idea of a female instinct structured in the woman's unconscious. By relating the notions of feminine, nature and psyche, Silveira returned to her earlier discourses when she understood the feminine as something naturalized.