The overpass and the samba: Largo da Banana, urbanization and race relations in São Paulo

• Grant number: 16/26239-8
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Start date: July 01, 2018
• End date: November 30, 2021
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Architecture and Town Planning - Fundamentals of Architecture and Urbanism
• Principal Investigator: Eduardo Alberto Cusce Nobre
• Grantee: Renata Monteiro Siqueira
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Arquitetura e Urbanismo (FAU). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This research aims to recover the memory of the "Largo da Banana", which used to be located nearby the Barra Funda´s train station, in São Paulo, from the station´s inauguaration, in 1875, to the construction of the Pacaembu viaduct, in 1958. Until the mid-century, that used to be a public space with an intense presence of black population, where afro-brazilian practices such as samba, carnival and tiririca used to take place. However, since the 1950 decade, architectural works related to the urban growth and the intensification of urbanization processes modified the daily routine in that place. In 1958, that lowland gave place to the Pacaembu viaduct, eliminating a space of black sociability and leading to its memory erasure. This research is based on the hypothesis that in spaces from São Paulo´s city that still had not been object of urban interventions, some territories of black sociability were constituted. From the moment these areas were integrated to the city´s urban plans, the permanence of black population wasn´t taken into consideration and became impossible. Thus, not only those people were expelled from those spaces, but they weren´t included in the equation of the set of demands to be contemplated by the urbanism field. In the present work, those conflicts are observed from a specific location, the "Largo da Banana", resorting to the intersection of several documentary sources, such as press publications, urban projects and samba lyrics, aiming to analyse the black sociability, the expulsion process and the resistance strategies that were adopted by those people in their daily lives. This is intended to bring to surface the racial issue in urban studies, a subject that still deserves to be deepened in this disciplinary field. (AU)

Scientific publications

(References retrieved automatically from Web of Science and SciELO through information on FAPESP grants and their corresponding numbers as mentioned in the publications by the authors)

RENATA MONTEIRO SIQUEIRA. O Largo da Banana e a presença negra em São Paulo. An. mus. paul., v. 28, 2020-07-15. (16/26239-8)

RENATA MONTEIRO SIQUEIRA. Lutas negras no largo da Banana. Tempo Social, revista de sociologia da USP, v. 33, n. 3, p. 281-300, 2022-01-07. (16/26239-8)

Academic Publications

(References retrieved automatically from State of São Paulo Research Institutions)

SIQUEIRA, Renata Monteiro. The overpass and the samba: Largo da Banana, urbanization, and race relations in São Paulo.. 2021. Doctoral Thesis - Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Arquitetura e Urbanismo (FAU/SBI) São Paulo.