Fenómenos de Miscelanização Cultural: O Raval de Barcelona

No decorrer do século XX, o bairro do Raval de Barcelona atravessou um período de mudanças profundas na sua estrutura urbana e na sua identidade cultural. Historicamente marcado pela actividade ligada ao ócio, à clandestinidade e à prostituição, o Barrio Chino (célebre designação que vigorou durante a quase totalidade do século) sofreu as reverberações de guerras, crises e vícios, esvaeceu com duras legislaturas e transfigurou-se em função das reformas urbanas. Hoje, o bairro é sinónimo de sociedade multicultural, de partilha e de mistura, não isentas de atritos sempre inerentes a tecidos sociais tão heterogéneos. O assentamento de numerosos colectivos imigrantes, de várias proveniências, foi acompanhado por um fenómeno de 'culturalização', ou, se quisermos ser mais específicos, de formação de uma identidade artística/cultural, responsável pela definição do Raval como epicentro da produção de arte contemporânea em Barcelona. Estes fenómenos têm-lhe facultado um carácter multicolor, que muita gente tem atraído, mas algumas 'feridas' lamentáveis do extinto Barrio Chino ainda persistem. Reunindo sinergias destes dois factores, a presente dissertação propõe-se estudar a validade dos equipamentos culturais, enquanto motores de activação de estratégias de renovação urbana e social. Os exemplos de sucesso constituídos por CCCB (Centro de Cultura Contemporânea de Barcelona) e MACBA (Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Barcelona), ambos sitos na zona norte do Raval, são o ponto de partida para um ensaio teórico e para uma proposta de projecto/esboço de 'edifício-chave' que fomente a renovação da área sul do bairro. Estes equipamentos - ou âncoras culturais - não se entendem como intervenções isoladas, mas antes como 'chaves' de um processo mais alargado e ambicioso, que pretende gerar acontecimentos, urbanidade, centralidade e polaridade. Questiona- -se o seu papel no desenvolvimento da cidade e, assim, no seu processo de 'refundação urbana'.During the twentieth century, the Raval's neighbourhood in Barcelona crossed a period of profound changes in its urban structure and in its cultural identity. Historically marked by activities related to leisure, illegal immigration and prostitution, the Barrio Chino (famous name that remained for almost the entire century) suffered the reverberations of wars, crises and addictions, vanished with hard legislatures and transfigured in the light of urban reforms. Today, the neighbourhood is synonymous of multicultural society, sharing and mixture, not always free from frictions intrinsic to so heterogeneous social compositions. The settlement of numerous immigrants, from various origins, was accompanied by a phenomenon of 'culturalization', or, more specifically, by a formation of an artistic/cultural identity, responsible for defining the Raval as the epicentre of contemporary art production in Barcelona. These phenomena have provided it a multicolour character that has attracted a lot of people, but some lamentable wounds of the extinct Barrio Chino still persist. Gathering synergies of these two factors, this thesis proposes to study the validity of cultural buildings as engines of strategies for urban and social renewal. Examples of success like CCCB (Barcelona Centre for Contemporary Culture) and MACBA (Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art), both located in the northern area of the Raval, are the starting point for a theoretical essay and for a proposal of project/draft for a 'key-building' to promote the renewal of the south area of the neighbourhood. We don't understand these devices - or cultural anchors - as isolated interventions, but as 'keys' to a more extensive and ambitious process, that pretend to generate events, urbanity, centrality and polarity. We question whether their role in city development and in its process of 'urban rebuilding'

Architecture, phenomenology & social dialogics

Descripció del recurs: 13 de maig de 2015The phenomenological and social analysis of architecture and planning are not a new subject matter. However a set of new conditions made them interesting again. First the impact of Mikhail Bakhtin’s dialogical philosophy. We reproduce here the incredible text of the lecture in Barcelona (June 2013) by Michael Holquist, biographer, translator and the best worldwide expert of Bakhtin’s ideas and works. This lecture is a basic text in order to understand not only Bakhtin but also the cultural meaning of architecture as such. Second the tandem work by Steven Holl and Juhani Pallasmaa on the perception of human existential space. See the work by our PHD student Shlomi Almagor in this issue. Third the need for new social phenomenology of architecture and urban planning education. The bases for that are in an article devoted to Lewis Mumford legacy and published in the international review Scienze del territorio (Vol 2) 2014, University of Florence

Estudio comparativo del consumo y uso de noticias televisivas de temática violenta en las zonas urbana y rural del municipio de Ciudad Victoria (Estado de Tamaulipas, México)

El presente estudio se inserta en la línea actual de Estudios Culturales, y más propiamente en los Estudios de Recepción, y tiene como objetivo principal contrastar los procesos de consumo y uso de las noticias de temática violenta, por parte de hombres y mujeres residentes en las zonas urbana y rural de Ciudad Victoria, Tamaulipas, México. Su finalidad procura dar respuesta a la pregunta “¿las noticias de violencia nos afectan por igual a quienes vivimos en la ciudad, como aquellos que viven en las áreas rurales?”. En cuanto a su sistemática metodológica, en el estudio se aplicó el enfoque integrado multimodal, es decir, tanto la metodología cuantitativa (mediante la aplicación de una encuesta, cuyo instrumento fue construido considerando objetivos, hipótesis, y datos como lugar de residencia, edad y sexo, y aplicado considerando tres estratos socioeconómicos: clase alta, clase media, y clase baja), como el enfoque cualitativo, que consistió en tres grupos de discusión en el área urbana y dos en el área rural. Entre los resultados más sobresalientes encontramos que ver televisión en casa resulta un acto social, en el que la familia se convierte en la primera comunidad de apropiación y en un importante centro que permite la integración social, y en el cual el jefe de familia se transforma en el primer líder de opinión y la mujer es quien aglutina y estimula al consumo colectivo de televisión: actividad desarrollada de forma intensa con independencia de su sexo, hábitat y clase social

Fuentes sobre radio. Un siglo de bibliografía internacional

Se ofrece en esta obra un repertorio de fuentes sobre el medio radio -bibliográficas, hemerográficas, sonoras, videográficas y electrónicas- aparecidas a lo largo de su más de un siglo de existencia. Aunque se ha otorgado lógica prioridad a las surgidas en los últimos 25 años, siempre de más fácil localización y etapa especialmente rica en publicaciones, se relacionan también obras creadas con anterioridad y que han devenido en clásicas, fueron relevantes en su momento, mantienen interés, aportan determinada singularidad o, sencillamente, resultan curiosas. Se ha dado asimismo preferencia en la selección a las fuentes disponibles sobre la propia evolución del medio, pero se han incluido apartados específicos sobre cada uno de los aspectos que configuran hoy, o lo han hecho en algún momento, la historia de la radio. Es patente la amplitud bibliográfica de determinadas coyunturas de esa historia -los pioneros, la radio propagandística de la II Guerra Mundial, las emisoras libres de los setenta-, frente a la pobreza de otras, como puedan ser los primeros lustros tras la aparición de la televisión

Transforming public spaces in Mexico :the case of colonias populares in Xalapa

PhD ThesisThe importance of public spaces in contemporary cities has been acknowledged and studied from different points of view and approaches by researchers of urbanism. However, most studies have focused on public spaces designed and produced by professionals for elite and affluent populations. In contrast, very little attention has been paid to the development of public spaces in those self-made urban environments "the popular habitat" of the developing world. In Mexican cities, the popular habitat is known as Colonias Populares (people's neighbourhoods) in which the urban environment consolidates and integrates to the city by gradual improvement processes at different levels of the urban environment from household up to neighbourhood level and mainly through the initiatives and participation of inhabitants. Within these processes, public spaces also play a very important role within the processes of consolidation and integration into the formal urban fabric. Within this context, the purpose of this thesis is to examine the dynamics of public space transformation within the urban consolidation process of colonias populares. The research examines various public spaces presenting different stages of consolidation in the colonias populares of the city of Xalapa-Veracruz in southeast Mexico. The research focuses on (1)the social relations and interactions of popular dwellers and other actors within the production process of public spaces; (2) the spatial actions and activities that give place to the physical configuration of public spaces as well as paying attention to the physical nature of the public space produced; (3) the different strategies and activities that residents and different actors carry out to protect, maintain and control public spaces; (4) finally, it studies the use, the possible conflicts over usage, appropriation and the role of the actors' culture and activities developing the life of public spaces in the popular habitat. To achieve a holistic understanding, the research examines the dynamics of public space transformation following a socio-spatial-symbolic framework of analysis, in which the urban environment is examined through its social and physical processes of development and materialization as well as its social and spatial process of everyday usage. Moreover this approach includes a symbolic dimension taking into account that these processes take place because of the meanings and representations that popular dwellers construct about their surrounding environment which in turn influences processes of urban production and consumption. The research is carried out using a qualitative methodology with an ethnographical approach based on a multi-method strategy. In this way, the thesis builds up its different arguments from informal conversations, semi-structured interviews, participant observation, photographs, personal documents, newspaper articles and drawings. This data was collected through extensive fieldwork carried out in five different colonias populares. It focused on specific public spaces in each neighbourhood. Through these cases the research seeks to demonstrate that public space transformation is important for popular dwellers in their agenda of urban consolidation. Finally, it aims to develop a greater understanding of the development and spatial construction of public spaces in the context of Mexican cities from which decision makers can learn in order to configure better public spaces and enhance the physical and social conditions of the urban environment, particularly in the context of the low-income population.The National Council of Science and Technology (Mexico)

El gènere periodístic cartes al director i el seu aprofitament en l’educació discursiva

A través del análisis del género periodístico de las cartas al director de los periódicos La Vanguardia, Ara, Diari de Sabadell i Levante, se pretende ofrecer a los docentes de diferentes niveles educativos una selección de las características del género que ayuden a la enseñanza de la producción de textos originales con una finalidad argumentativa o persuasiva, tomando como modelo las cartas al director por su proximidad con la competencia de los estudiantes y por la manifiesta claridad de la finalidad que persiguen (denuncia, crítica, felicitación...). En los primeros capítulos se recorre la historia del género y se desgranan las características macrodiscursivas de las cartas. Posteriormente se analiza la presencia del emisor a través de las marcas paratextuales y textuales, profundizando en la confluencia de esas dos presentaciones (la coincidencia del ethos dicho y el ethos mostrado) y la referencia al receptor o receptores (tanto autorizados como no autorizados) mediante la voces o tratamientos que se pueden rastrear en los textos de referencia. Finalmente, presentamos una caracterización pragmaestilística del género (el uso de la argumentación, de la concesión; la elección estilística de verbos, adjetivos o adverbios, etc.) que enlaza con los recursos lingüísticos que permitan mantener una postura cortés en la defensa de las propias ideas, denuncias o propuestas. En definitiva, pretendemos ofrecer a estudiantes y profesores estrategias para identificar cómo puede defenderse una posición determinada sin atacar verbalmente al oponente (o los destinatarios en el discurso escrito) y cómo pueden contrarrestarse dialécticamente opiniones contrarias. Todo ello en el marco de la reivindicación de una educación discursiva que resulte significativa en el aprendizaje lingüístico