Urban dérives and interventions: a psychosocial study of territorialization on the outskirts of Rome, Italy

• Grant number: 24/14625-7
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Master's degree
• Start date: February 01, 2025
• End date: June 30, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Interdisciplinary Subjects
• Principal Investigator: Flavia Liberman Caldas
• Grantee: Cesar Mezzomo Keinert
• Supervisor: Francesco Careri
• Host Institution: Instituto de Saúde e Sociedade (ISS). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus Baixada Santista. Santos , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Università degli Studi Roma Tre, Italy
• Associated to the scholarship: 23/16048-4 - DÉRIVE: TERRITORIALIZATION OF URBAN SPACE IN SÃO PAULO, BP.MS

Abstract

The research internship at Roma Tre University, under the supervision of Professor Francesco Careri, is part of the research "Dérive: territorialization of urban space in the city of São Paulo" (FAPESP - process nº 2023/16048-4). The objectives of this internship are: 1) Participate in the Civic Arts course (Arti Civiche) - all of it in person and in the field, and learn about Careri's work methodology in relation to walking and intervention in public space; 2) Investigate the phenomenon of territorialization on the outskirts of Rome through individual dérives and during the Civic Arts course, in group dérives; 3) Search the local bibliography on the history of walking and urban dérive. The urban dérive developed by the Situationists is used as a theoretical-practical reference, highlighting its unproductive, playful and oppositional character. As Careri puts it, this practice was intended to be "a type of psychological investigation of one's own relationship with urban reality". Dérive aims at the sensorial and subjective experience in urban space, in a phenomenon we call territorialization, in the sense theorized by Deleuze and Guattari. Territorialization is a subjective relationship between beings, the environment and the various elements that compose it, being problematized since the advent of modernity, using the term deterritorialization. The practice of urban walking aims to give new meaning to the relationship with space, normally characterized by fear and insecurity. The methodology used will be cartography, which maps a psychosocial landscape, organizing experiences, affections, ideas opened in the field and research readings. Automatic writing and field diaries will be carried out to report these psychosocial movements. The experiences of dérive in Rome will have a huge contribution to the master's research, which studies urban territorialization through dérives and its subjective and corporal effects on the participants. The internship will provide knowledge of dérive studies at a global level.