Migrants and city-making: urban trajectories of transnational migrants in São Paulo

Author(s)

Tiago Rangel Côrtes

• Document type: Doctoral Thesis
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD)
• Defense date: 2023-10-11

Examining board members

Vera da Silva Telles; José Lindomar Coelho Albuquerque; Bianca Stella Pinheiro de Freire Medeiros; Fernando Rabossi

• Advisor: Vera da Silva Telles

Abstract

This is a research on transnational migration, focusing on the city and the production of urban spaces. The main research approach is the reconstruction of life trajectories of different groups of transnational migrants who have arrived in the Metropolitan Region of São Paulo (RMSP) in the last decade. In general terms, the aim is to understand the relationship between these people and the urban space, highlighting the fields of sociability and networks of relationships built in the city. In the first chapter, a reference framework is proposed for understanding and analyzing the presence of migrants in São Paulo. In particular, the concepts of city-making and the binomial emplacement/displacement are discussed in depth (Çaglar; Glick Schiller, 2018). The Thesis adopts a descriptive theoretical-methodological approach. It is in reconstructing the trajectory of the participants in the research that it becomes possible to pull the threads for reading the present. By adopting an urban lens to look at migratory issues, we suggest a kaleidoscopic perspective, which allows us to understand the multiple crossings involved in the migratory issue, with an emphasis on the alliances and relationships engendered by a network of socio-institutional actors. In the second chapter, we start with the observation of Missão Paz, a well-known organization that works on different fronts with migrants in São Paulo. It is suggested that the organization functions as a scale operator and urban connector, in other words, a gravitational pole for the migratory issue in the city. As a scale operator, the institution gains relevance at the most different levels of debate, articulating the ways in which São Paulo enters the arena of transnational migration. As an urban connector, the area around the institution has a dynamic based on the presence of these transnational mobilities. We then look at a collective organized by migrants who have connected through the entity, the Pacto pelo Direito de Migrar; we talk to the Sociedade Beneficente Muçulmana; and finally, we outline some considerations about the insertion of transnational migrants in a housing squat in the Mooca neighbourhood. Then, in the third chapter, pulling on one of the threads found in Missão Paz, the analysis is based on fieldwork carried out in Jardim Piratininga, in the East Zone of São Paulo. The focus is on the trajectories of Brazilian and transnational migrants who have intertwined in the neighborhood, building varied living and working arrangements. The final chapter looks at the political issues surrounding the alliances and struggles of migrants in São Paulo. The emphasis is on understanding how articulations are engendered between different actors who constitute a central pole for the consolidation of a worthy life (Butler, 2018) (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 18/05234-3 - The city and transnational migrations: a socio-political cartography of migrants in São Paulo in the 21st century
• Grantee: Tiago Rangel Côrtes
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate