1

CULTURAL DIVERSITY AND THE USE OF HISTORICAL HERITAGE AS LEISURE

PLACES

Prof. Dr. Antonio Carlos Machado Guimares

Universidade do Vale do Paraba So Jos dos Campos SP- Brazil
ac.guimaraens@gmail.com
Ana Carolina Marini Figueira dos Santos
Universidade do Vale do Paraba So Jos dos Campos SP- Brazil
mariniturismo@gmail.com
Key-words: Public Space; Historical Heritage; Cultural Diversity; inequality
Abstract:
In 1996, a property of a traditional family was incorporated by Municipal Government and
converted in a public park in So Jos dos Campos (State of So Paulo, Brazil). Formerly, it was a
complex, comprising a farm, the installations of the first textile factory of the city, also including
the homes of the owners and of the employees; so that this area achieved a remarkable relevance for
the historical heritage of the city. It comprises the gardens projected by Roberto Burle Marx a home
designed by Rino Levi; both included among the most important names of the modern Brazilian
architecture in 20th Century. How people use this historical heritage in their leisure time? What is
more attractive for a heterogeneous set of users there? These were our departure questions. In our
approach, we seek for the relation of the form with sociological and anthropological variables,
leading the perception and the use of that public space.

2
Presentation

The increasing of industrialization and urbanization, with an accelerated population growth,

impacted very strongly the life style and sociability in So Jos dos Campos. The effects are also
felt in the form and usage of in leisure places that are located in this city. In this work, we are going
to approach of the Burle Marx Park; where it's possible to exam a particular combination of the
shortage of leisure places, which reaches mainly the inhabitants of the peripheral neighborhoods,
and a specific process of recovering of important stages of the History of the city. In such
discussion, we intend to relate the construction of collective memories to the scale of places like
that, considering what we perceive as an disagreement between the project by planners and the
used by frequenters, in other words; within a process in which a metropolitan park is converted in a
juxtaposition of neighborhood leisure places.

A Brief Characterization of the City and its History

So Jos dos Campos is located between the two biggest cities in Brazil. Its located about
90 km from So Paulo and 300 km from Rio de Janeiro. Its economy is mainly bound to high
technology industries, particularly those related to aerospace activities. As result, its inhabitants
hold a high level in their life condition. The City occupies the 32nd position within the Human
Development rank in Brazil and the 11th among the 645 municipalities of the State.

However, contrasting with this global situation, it's possible to observe deep inequality

3
among the social segments that live there. This also reaches the distribution of public services in
the urban, in what we detach the concentration of the main leisure places in the core of the city
(figure 1, above)
The authors also measured the difference in the amount of public squares available in each
region. Herein, we can observe numbers varying from 3 until 6 squares by group of 10,000
inhabitants, with the municipal average of 5 squares (Table 1).

TABLE 1
Distribution of Public Squares by Region
So Jos dos Campos -Brazil
2010
MACROZONES

Population*

Squares

Distribution**

West
Southeast
North
Center
East
South

25.182
38.761
56.187
70.863
136.180
199.913

15
15
16
57
58
84

6
4
3
8
4
4

Municipality

527.086

245

source: Tomazette e Costa, 2001

* 2000 data
** Square per 10.000

The available space is short for a discussion in deep. However, its important to detach two
factors in basis of this distribution. At first, the accelerated increased of the population and the
urban area of the Municipality in the last decades. The municipality population totalized 148.332 in
1970. It jumped to 629921 in the last census, realized in 20101. Herein it's added the pattern of
inequality in offering public resources that is observed in Brazil. The common situation in our most
industrialized cities is the poorest living at peripheral areas with shortage in infrastructure and
public services offering, including the leisure ones.
As result of this development process, its important to mention the expressive number of
migrants in So Jos dos Campos, coming from another cities of the State, other states and even
from other countries. Most of them live in the city for a small while. In 2000, the Brazilian Institute of
Geography and Statistics collected a sample of the inhabitants of this city. Its data revealed that
about 16 percent of the individuals 15 or more years old were living in So Jos dos Campos for
less than 5 years.2. In view of that, we think it's hard to find an actual sense of belonging within a
1 Source: Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics
2 Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. Microdata of 2000 census.

4
so heterogeneous population and so new in town.
Returning to the economic history of So Jos dos Campos, we are going to detach a
transition occurred by the half of the 20th century, when the road President Dutra was inaugurated.
The new road provided for a better transit between the two majors cities in Brazil, So Paulo and
Rio de Janeiro, pushed the industrialization of the city, particularly by the action of the municipal
government, which offered several privileges, as land donation and fiscal advantages, for
implanting industries in its territory. Ever since, the city is receiving great investments by industries
and nowadays is one the most important industrial polo in the country
At the time the road was inaugurated, two branches had predominated in economic life of
the town. One of them comprised few manufactures, as weaving and ceramics. Another was the
activity by which the city was identified at that time, sanatoriums for tuberculosis treatment. So
Jos dos Campos was an important center of tuberculosis treatment in the first half of 20th
Century. By the time this was the main business in town.
The advance in medicine techniques, with the obsolescence of the sanatoriums, pushed
the displacement of the economical life in town. Ever since, the traditional branches are being
replaced by the modern, with modern industries and high technology agencies taking place its
territory. However, this wasnt a linear process, in manner it produced several towns living side by
side in the same territory, while the industrialization process was going on:
The Town was living in a stranger paradox. Several industries were installed in its
territory and local economy grew at the same speed than the observed in industrial
production at ends of the road that linked Rio and So Paulo. However, downtown
showed the appearance of a shy village that resisted the seducing of industrialization
displaced from cities like the state capitals of So Paulo and Rio de Janeiro or even
of that directly arrived from other countries. (SOUSA E SOARES, 2002).

The economic transition pushed spatial changes. The industrial activity moved from the
North Region - the Burle Marx Park is located at the boundary between North and Center Region to the edges of the President Dutra Road. But the major change was in self representation of the
city. Its identification as a tuberculosis treatment center was uncomfortable for the former dwellers.
Its common the stories of people who covered their noses with handkerchiefs when the train was
stopped at So Jos dos Campos railway station. The city made efforts in changing of this stigma.
It seeks change this representation for an image of high technology center and industrial
dynamism, is expressed particularly in another park at the city. The Santos Dumont Park, honoring
"the father of aviation", occupies nowadays the same area of the Ezra Sanatorium, which served
the Jewish community in the past (Figure 2)

Figure 2
Ezra Sanatorium (1) and Santos Dumont Park (2)

Sources:
(1) Pro-memory project. Universidade do
Vale do Paraba / City of So Jos dos
Campos.
(2) Photo by Leonardo Angelo Lunard

The bind between space and collective memory in this city can be introduced from the
example of this park. It demonstrates that the population, at least the municipal government,
prefers to think its history starting from the decade of 1950'. As we can examine bellow, this
perspective is inscribed into the shape of the Park and its paths. By now, its important to detach
that the north region was the area where the former manufactures and a worker population were
concentrated. Many of the workers of the ancient industries frequently were relatives of people who
came to the city seeking for tuberculosis treatment. Nowadays, the marks of this period are
disappearing at the neighborhood, despite the resistance of some dwellers organizations.

Socio-Spatial Inequality and the Usage of Burle Marx Park

As we announced above, the park suffers the influence of a misdistribution of the leisure
equipments in the territory. It responses to the shortage of places for this practice in other regions
of the city, particularly of those related to the outdoor leisure. In the next topic, we can examine
how this impacts the bond of the place with the collective memory. By now, its important to
highlight a specific use we could notice Therein and which interferes in the scale predictable for the
area by planners.
Strictly, the parks are projected in a metropolitan scale, predictable for a contemplative
usage. In this sense, they are especially suitable for memory related practices. On the other hand,
they differ of the squares. These last ones, defined as local and neighborhood spaces, serves to
simpler activities, particularly to those related to the people sociability. Somehow, they are what

6
Magnani (2000) had named as "Pedaos" (Pieces), a place of more intimicy, a place where groups
of friends feed their social relationship.
Concerning the Burle Marx Park, we are dealing with a park which cant be easily
characterized by its scale. Its structure enables a varied scope of activities, in manner that it is
used so much as place for the realization of great events, in a metropolitan scale, as a meeting
point for people from several neighborhoods. We must also consider that all these activities are for
free, which weakens the economic barriers in the users attractiveness.
Before proceeding, it's necessary to advise that in this topic and the following, we are using
preliminary data extracted from a research on this park, nowadays developed at Universidade do
Vale do Paraiba within the "Pro-Memory Project". The techniques that are being used are the
successive hiking3 by the space, when we try identify some regularities of who and how uses the
space. Afterwards, we applied a survey seeking for a better characterization of their frequenters.
By now, we are in stage of interviewing and data treatment. We are also examining some croquis
and photos of the place, seeking for contrasts among different spatial cutouts, regarding their
physical characteristics and the usage of them by people.
In hiking, we notice at first that the alternatives of space are differently appropriate by the
several groups of frequenters. However, a feature seems be common to most of them, the
tendency for using narrow cutouts of the park. Thence, our definition of this park as a juxtaposition
of squares and other kinds of local equipments.
This was greatly confirmed by the results of the survey applied at beginning of our
research. Rare frequenters refer to use of two or more sites in the Park. For instance, one of them
that are mainly mentioned is the playground; that strictly is a type of equipment at the level of the
neighborhood or should be.
At first, we had advanced the idea that the public of the Park is different at labor days and
weekend, in what we could identify the differences regarding its usage. This was not confirmed by
the results of the survey. For instance, considering the variables of age and gender, we found
numbers very close. The gender distribution is about the same at both periods, with a discrete
predominance of male (about 52%). On the other hand, the median for age is about 30 years old,
again without expressive contrast between Labor Day and weekend.
However, some differences concerning the education level of the public were noted, with a
little advantage for weekend frequenters. As we can see in the table bellow, the low education user
is more frequent in the labor days. In contrast, while it's observed a greater participation of
graduated and pos-graduated people at weekend. Herein it's important to regard the major
frequency of housewives in the labor days (38 percent, against 25 percent at weekend),
3 Magnani (2000) describe this technique as an important way to perceive the regularities of the places.

7
considering that they remain out of employment market and, thus, are less pressed to efforts in
education. Anyhow, its important to notice the predominance of high school in both periods; as we
can see in the same table (Table 2, bellow).

TABLE 2
Education Level of Frequenters
Burle Marx Park. So Jos dos Campos. Brazil
2010

Labor Day
n
(%)
2
1.1
29
15.2
116 60.7
40
20.9
4
2.1
191 100.0

EDUCATION LEVEL
Uneducated
Fundamental
High School
Graduate
Posgraduate
Total

Weekend
n
(%)
1
0.3
33
10.6
189 60.8
76
24.4
12
3.9
311 100.0

Total
n
(%)
3
0.6
62
12.4
305 60.8
116 23.1
16
3.2
502 100.0

source: survey by authors

In regarding to the differences of public profile, their origins seem the most important of
them. The characteristic of a park attending its neighborhood, that is predominant in the labor
days, is displaced by affluence of people from other areas of the city. The participation of the
dwellers at its surroundings are the majority at the middle of the week (The Park is located at the
boundary of North and Center Region), from where come about 60 percent of the users.
TABLE 3
Origin of frequenters of Burle Marx Park. So Jos dos Campos.Brazil
2010
REGION

Labor Day

Weekend

Center
East
North
West
Southeast
South
Other Cities
Total

(%)
30
15
85
9
15
35
2
191

15.7
7.9
44.5
4.7
7.9
18.3
1.0
100.0

Total
(%)

36
67
84
5
10
80
28
310

11.6
21.6
27.1
1.6
3.2
25.8
9.0
100.0

(%)
66
82
169
14
25
115
30
501

13.2
16.4
33.7
2.8
5.0
23.0
6.0
100.0

source: survey by authors

In absolute numbers their frequency varies little. In an opposite movement, we can observe
the increase of the frequency other regions inhabitants. Among those we detach the people from
South Region, one of the poorest areas of the municipality, but one of the areas with worst
accessibility to the park (Table 3)

8
Along the work, our attention was directed for the variations in the geographic origin of the
public, what seems meaningful for understanding of the usage of the park. As we insisted above,
the shortage of leisure equipments is great in the peripheral areas. In view of this, its plausible the
expectation of the Park is performing functions proper to local places, like squares and soccer
fields. Hence, more than the variation, the attractiveness the Park for disadvantaged populations is
in the basis of the motivation for the usage by the dwellers from distant neighborhoods. This is
what shows us testimonials like the following:
The Park in urban center is very good for us, who have low income for
travelling. The Park is a great choice (...) near my home there is no park like
this. (Female, 39 years old)

Concluding, our first perception was confirmed in survey and interviews that followed the
hiking. Apparently, everyday public of the Park, remain distant from some activities that could be
classified as metropolitan ones. In this sense, its necessary to mention the great events, which
gather a great public, for instance, the show with a popular singer in commemoration of the city
birthday in 2010. The data of Police of the State points the attendance of about 120,000 people or
the editions of the "Revealing So Paulo", a event with the duration of some days, with typical
foods, music performances, handicraft; all of them related to the various patterns that are in basis of
the culture of the State, the City and its surroundings. Such activities were mentioned only by a
small number of people (about 1 percent of the users). So, it remains the suggestion that the
metropolitan public of the Park differs largely of its everyday users.
Anyhow, this characterization of the functions of the Park introduces the issue of its role in
the construction of a collective memory shared by the city population. This is the discussion of next
topic, when we are going focus the articulation of the design, the representation of municipal
history and the profile of the city population.
The Burle Marx Park: Collective Memories and the Social Representation of the City

In this paper we are dealing with the articulation of spatial arrangement and meaning in
recovery projects destinated to public leisure. In other words, were concerned to the new
meanings attached to historical places in such projects, considering their relationship with different
and diversified people.

9
We start with the admission that something transcends the materiality of a place and its
objects. This quality was named by Halbwachs (1992) as "Collective Memory" and it is greatly
constructed by the perception the group has of their history in the territory, converting each
building, each rock in a fragment of this totality. Moreover, the author detaches, it has the capacity
in surviving to the changes, even in the absence of the former landscape
The Burle Marx Park enables the discussion of this issue. For this, it's necessary at first
remind the importance of the former property within the city history. In 1927, the Gomes family
settled in its farm one of the first industries of the town .Thence, this space still holds marks of first
stages of the industrialization process of So Jos dos Campos. Not only this, but of the previous
affairs of the property, when restricted to rural activities (a milk plant, for instance) and of the
following decades, in which we detach several examples of the modern Brazilian architecture,
projected by some of most representative professionals of the period.
At the half of 20th century, Brazil harbored many modern tendencies in several branches of
Art; popular and erudite music, theatre, movies, plastic arts and architecture. At this moment the
Gomes family, as important member of Brazilian bourgeoisie, was related to many of these artists.
Thus, we also can find buildings, paintings and gardens that are projected by acknowledged
architects and artists in Brazil. Among then, one can highlight the gardens projected by Roberto
Burle Marx, who gives the name to the Park, besides Olivio Gomes Residence, signed by Rino
Levi.
In short, we are dealing with a space which is representative of two stages of the History of
So Jos dos Campos. At first, its related to the beginning of industrialization in town, a phase
when manufactures and disease walked together. The simultaneity of industrialization and disease
represents an uncomfortable memory for the population, mainly the former ones, since the most
recent ignore the previous presence of sanatoriums in its territory. However, the two activities were
bound somehow, as in fact that within the worker population gathered relatives of patients. Related
to this stage, there is the old set of the weaving and farm installations, which are now occupied by
bureaucrat agencies. On the other hand, the space also is bound to the transition of the city, and of
the country as a whole, to the modernity, what is expressed by the architectural works of the half of
the 20th century.
This data are not only for the recognition of the importance of this historical heritage. We
are pointing the issue of how the social agents position themselves face to a transformed site.
Here, we are going to deal with 3 of them. One, condensed in the person of the planner, to who we
are going to attribute the park design in which one can recognize somehow an intention of deleting
part of the history of the city, particularly its association with the tuberculosis treatment. Another
one is related to the population of the Park surroundings, among them we detach those who were
the weaving workers or of other manufactures of the neighborhood, including their children and

10
relatives that knew the previous space. At last, the new population of So Jos dos Campo, for
most of them this History remains ignored.
Starting from a characteristic of the dealing with collective memory in So Jos dos
Campos, we detach the efforts of municipal government in representing it as a modern city,
harboring high technology activities. As we mentioned above, this is expressed in spatial elements,
particularly in a park that replaced a sanatorium. In the same sense we can assist a kind of neglect
in caring places related to tuberculosis treatment by municipal government. Another of its parks is
an old sanatorium too, which was projected by Ramos de Azevedo, an acknowledged architect at
beginning of 20th century. Although, the historical importance of the place, the buildings remain
untouchable and just its gardens at outside are used4. Now, we are going to examine how the
design of the Park expresses the same tendency for deletion of the previous history of the
Municipality.

As we can see in the croquis above (figure 3), two great areas are discriminated in the
management plan of the Park. One, in blue, comprises the area of the Gomes family residence,
while the weaving area is detached in red. Notice that the space isn't used as whole as a Park,
only the area in blue. What is in red is the area used by the bureaucratic agencies and an Art
school, maintained by a cultural foundation bound to the municipal government. In the drawing, we
also detach the two main entrances at the space. A green arrow, identified by the letter "P", is
showing the access to the Park area. Another, brown and identified as "G", points to entrance to
government agencies and the art school.
Its important to highlight the different architectural features at each area. The weaving
buildings and others that accompany it are built in patterns from the beginning of the 20th century.
4

When the government agents refer to its future use, they dont say a single word that points to the sanatorium stage
memory

11
They contrast with the residence and its surroundings. In that, the architectural pattern is
representative of the modern architecture in Brazil (Figure 4).

FIGURE 4: THE TWO AREAS AT PRESENT

1.

The Rino Levi Project

2.

Burle Marx Gardens as Park

3.

The Previous Building of Weaving

4.

An abandoned Swimming Pool. Behind, the weaving building.

Photos by Davi Carneiro Guimares

Moreover, we bounce here the barriers that hinder an easy transit between both areas. With
the example of another park, we intended to show a practice of hiding part of the municipal history.
There, this was expressed by the replacement of a former sanatorium, nowadays a park honoring
the aerospace activities. In Burle Marx, the same appears in a spatial segregation of the older
area. First, by the separate entrances, when already in the Park area, people are induced to dont
move themselves to another place by the precarious paths between them (Figure 5).
Before referring to the users that inhabit at the city for short while, we are going to approach the
ancient dwellers of the neighborhood. Herein, itll be raised the issue the relation of the space and
the construction of their collective memories. In such cases, we are dealing with fragments of
personal and social history attached to places and objects by people who grew up in the
neighborhood, including those who worked in property before its converting as a park.
I was born in Santana (the neighborhood of the Park). Before, my father worked

12
inside, when it still was the Olvio Gomes home. I grew up visiting the place. Fifty
years ago. There was no avenue, even the viaduct. The weaving had the whole
thing. (Man 53 years old)

FIGURE 5
Port option between the Park and the industrial area

Photo by authors

This fragment of speech puts out another kind of force intervening in perception of space,
its relation with the personal and collective memory of neighborhood dwellers. Regard of this one
can mention the relative stability of the population who lives around the Park. Also, their
engagement in preservation of the local memory in actions that unfold in the struggle for preserving
of the ancient railway station and other architectural marks or in the event that honors the
"mineiros" referring to origin of the first inhabitants of the neighborhood, the state of Minas Gerais
(KOJIO, 2009). This speech contrasts with the representation of the place and its history that we
could identify in official policies. In that, the meaning of the place is rewritten in the publicity
directed to the enlarged population of the city and to tourists, with the aid the design of the Park,
which highlights some elements and hamper the perception of others.
On the other hand, we cant forget the people who grew up in another neighborhood and
just recently knew this area of the city, when already there were the avenue and the viaduct and
the weaving didnt exist anymore. It is a great number of person to who one must add those who
came from other cities and are living in So Jos dos Campos for a short while.
For this last group, the history of the place has no relevance and the social representation
of high technology city, which is promoted by the government publicity, is more attractive. Among
them, the mention to the historical marks in the space, as the residence projected by Rino Levi, are

13
rare. Even the Burle Marx gardens are referred in generic terms as the trees, without the bind of
the work with the author and with his historical importance.
Above, we intended characterize the use of the Park as a response to the shortage in
offering public leisure services in other areas of the city. This situation also reaches the inhabitants
of the North region, where the Park is located, due its extension and the few equipments Therein.
One must recognize too that the local population is changing, despite a greater stability observed
than in other neighborhoods. So, even among the local dwellers we found people weakly
concerned with the neighborhood and its history. Such ties, only could be perceived by using of
qualitative methods, since they are absent in the most of the interviewed or they remain hidden in a
few of the ancient dwellers. We also saw that the proposed design by the planners press the break
of the tie between the site and the history of the place. Thereby, the design interacts with the
frequenters profile, in what we detach their heterogeneity - social, cultural and geographic.

FINAL CONSIDERATIONS

In this work, we departure from the issue of the differences inscribed in the planner's
conception and the sense that is revealed by the users practice, not forgetting that much of what
the people can perceive from space is a result of an imposition by the design. The project induces
some articulations between some places, while hinders other of them. Referring ourselves to
Certeau's work (1980), we understood the design as a grammar, which conducts the speech
possibilities, while the last comprises the actual manner of using the built space.
Although we are dealing with preliminary data, it was possible recognize two factors
pressing the use. First, the shortage of leisure places in other regions of the city. This displaces the
function of equipments like square to the metropolitan park, which enabled us to perceive the
functioning of the Park as a juxtaposition of smaller cutouts. Somehow, there is interference in the
scale of the planned by the actual use of it.
The other element identified was a collective memory that still remains among the dwellers
of Park surroundings. Many of them were workers in the ancient weaving or their children, who
was used to visiting the place in other times. For them, a hiking in Park is such a return to the "old
good times".
Dialoguing with the place history we must detach an impulse toward a representation of the
city as technological center, which faces a place identified mainly with a historical stage that the
new inhabitants don't know and the old want to forget. Herein, the paths that hid of the marks of the
ancient weaving. Even the presence of examples of modern architecture is unkempt, as in a Burle
Marx wall painting, hidden in a garage (figure 6).

14
We are not proposing here a freezing of memory. However, it seems important it be
considered in a context, which we can observe a great number of migrants in population. The
appropriation of this history is condition for their inclusion in the city life and for the citizenship of
those who has their collective memory related to that period.

FIGURE 6
Wall Paintings by Roberto Burle Marx

Photo by authors

REFERENCES:

CERTEAU, Michel de. L'invention du quotidien. Paris: Union gnrale d'ditions, 1980
HALBWACHS, Maurice, On collective memory, Chicago (IL), The University of Chicago Press,
1992
KOJIO, Ndia. Polticas Pblicas de Patrimnio em So Jos dos Campos. 2009. UNIVAP.
Dissertao de Mestrado
MAGNANI, Jose Guilherme Cantor. Quando o campo a cidade. In MAGNANI, J. G. C, TORRES,
L. L. (org). Na metropole : textos de Antropologia urbana. So Paulo: EDUSP, 2000
SOUSA, Ana; SOARES, L. Laerte. Modernidade e Urbanismo Sanitrio. So Jos dos Campos:
A.M.S. Sousa, L. L. Soares, 2002.
TOMAZETTE, Marcela; COSTA, Sandra. Mapeamento das Praas Pblicas de So Jos dos
Campos. Anais do XV Simpsio Brasileiro de Sensoriamento Remoto. Curitiba, PR, Brazil, 2011.