DEFRAGMENTATION OF URBAN LANDSCAPE AND DELETION OF HISTORICAL

MEANINGS*
Antonio Carlos Machado Guimaraes - Universidade do Vale do Paraíba (Brazil)
Marco Antonio Villarta-Neder - Universidade Federal de Lavras (Brazil)

ABSTRACT
Some proposals of recovery of degraded areas in great cities can have deep impact in the
perception of the historical patrimony. This is a process that is unfolded so much in the verbal
plan, as in the urban design. The ressignification has as requirement the fragmentation of the
places, isolating some of their elements, to integrate them in new sets. In this sense, the
discourse that builds these relationships and the itineraries that connect points in the space
converge in the deletion and ressignification of the built landscape.

Key-words: Urban recovering; Historical Patrimony; Collective Memory; Landscape

INTRODUCTION

Urban Projects is not immune to ideological processes. This implicates in the

appropriation of the landscape´s elements for a new discourse and in the relationship among
points before separate in the space.
Like this, the fragmentation of the built landscape, disrespecting the set in that each
construction originally enrolled, it turns off the sense that it possessed for the collective memory
of social groups. However, such deletion is necessary to the re-signification of historical
patrimony elements, which plays a role in the construction of a new image of the area to be
revitalized.
Our object is a neighborhood in the central area of São Paulo, Brazil. She was formed in
the context of the substitution of the slave work by the free one. In the ends of the 19 th century,
the inauguration of the Luz Rail Station attracted immigrants that settled in its surroundings,
forming the neighborhood of the Bom Retiro (Good Retreat).
After more than one century, the central region of São Paulo loses the importance for
other poles of the city, motivating countless proposals of its recovery. Among these we
detached two: the projects “Monumenta” and the “Nova (New) Luz”.
* Paper presented at Sixteenth International Seminar on Urban Form. Guangzhou, China, 4 - 7 September 2009

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 The first - accomplished under the responsibility of the Institute of the Historical and
Artistic National Patrimony (IPHAN) with funds of the Inter-american Bank of Development -
it drives a group of punctual interventions of restoring in historical buildings, which are located
in the neighbourhood of Bom Retiro. In this task, IPHAN counts with the support of municipal
and state agencies of historical preservation.
The Nova Luz is project of the Municipal Government of São Paulo. In contrast with the
Monumenta, he is not ruled by punctual interventions, since it delimits an area of about 225
hectares, proposing a global intervention of recovery in that region. One of their possible
unfoldings is the re-signification of the elements of the historical patrimony, considering that
such elements of the landscape were built in different contexts and related to the history of
different social groups. This way, the proposed intervention constitutes an important vector of
deletion of historical meanings enrolled in the landscape. It´s a condition to communicate an
different image for the central area of São Paulo.
We can frame the Bom Retiro in this condition. Although no included in the established
perimeter for the Nova Luz project, the Neighbourhood is suffering their effects. Official
agencies have been trying to forge a new image for that area, in which is noticed the deletion of
a lot of its historical meaning and of the sense that possessed for the immigrants' descending
groups. In this sense, it is still worth to stand out that the Nova Luz perimeter extends until the
border of the Neighborhood. So, the both projects are about related to the same historical
patrimony.
In view of this process, our concern in the theoretical plan is sent to discuss the changes
in the meaning of the symbolic goods. We are going to see them in of, tends as contexts of the
formation of local or national symbols.
This theme has been occupying Latin-American sociologists, among which we detached
Néstor Canclini's (1997) and Renato Ortiz´s (1994) works. These authors propose an approach
that leaves of the consideration of the context - historical, social, cultural - in that the culture
good is enrolled. They the terms territorialization, deterritorialization and reterritorialization in
anthropological sense. According with them, we recognize deletions of the sense that an
building possessed in a context (deterritorialization) and the attribution of new senses, when this
good is enrolled in a new set and assumes the place of symbol of a place or country
(reterritorialization).

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 Like this, we regonize a process of rewriting of the Bom Retiro in the interventions that
are done in the center of São Paulo. In that we noticed the deletion of senses attributed to
elements of its landscape, although their importance in the construction of the collective
memory of groups that inhabit or inhabited that neighbourhood. In this task, our focus will be
the discourse of the Municipal Government, understood as a collective enunciator, and the
proposed interventions as a reterritorialization process.

METHODOLOGICAL NOTES

Our analysis material are the texts published by the Municipal City Hall of São Paulo in
its official page at Internet. It will be restricted here to the directly related to the Neighborhood
of the Bom Retiro and the Nova Luz project. Our approach is unfolded in two levels. Inspired in
the discipline of the Discourse Analysis – French view, start with the strictly verbal. In that the
notions of Already-said and non-said, own of DA, they will be an important support. They are
added to the idea of Game of Images, also of the same discipline to place the speaker and his
relationship with the space and with the audience (Pêcheux, 1990). On another wayt, we will
find an equivalence of the discourse in the itineraries induced by the urban planning. For so
much, we should consider the displacement alternatives as an articulation of places. They are
restricted by a virtual set, own to each culture. In this perspective, the drawing of the cities
serves as inductor of some itineraries and barrier for others. In this level, our inspiration comes
from Michel of Certeau (1990), whose association of the Map to the Language and of the
Itinerary to the Discourse. In that intervenes the pedestrian's subjectivity and the investment
symbolic associate to each place through where passes.
Thus, related to what to say and to where to go, both choices are culturally and
ideologically constrained. We should remind that the Discourse Analisis gets tied up to the
contexts where each dialogue happens and to the effects of sense among speakers. Considering
the inspiration of the Discourse Analisis in the marxism of Althusser, we still must highlight the
concept of Discursive Formation as updating of the Ideological Formation.The Game of Images
is based at the social and discursive place of speaker. Each of them manipulates images on
itself, on the Other and on the context, when he speaks.
We took a risk here to speak in a “grammar of the space”. As we saw, in the same way
that the Discursive Formations restrict the possibilities in speaking, the urban drawing doesn't

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allow a free displacement through the space. Besides, the places are related in the pathways and
in this articulation they compose systems, from where extract their sense. Like this, we can
propose an analogy between Discursive Form and Urban Drawing. They have similar behavior
when they attempt to impose behaviors to individuals questioned in the positions that occupy in
the social space.
José Guilherme Magnani (2000) described two important elements of this grammar: the
stain and the Circuit. The stain refers to the areas which are characterized by the use
homogeneity. Brasília, the Brazilian federal capital, serves as example of a city that distributes
their activities in well delimited stains. It is composed for different and specialized sectors:
financial, hotel, administrative, residential. In the circuits, we found another homogeneity type,
which is based on the urban public's segmentation. The cultural and of consumption patterns of
each one drive the different alternatives of occupation of the territory, articulating places
dispersed over it, for segments of the population that differ in their demands. Certain linked
circuits to the cultural consumption, as the one of specialized houses of shows in certain music
type, serve as example for this form of occupation of the space.
At the end of this article, we will attempt to notice the convergence of the verbal with
the configuration of the space. Like this, we will drive our attention for the moments in that
marks of the landscape are reterritorialized, when the Public Agent's discourse proposes their
integration in new circuits or stains. In this stage, we’ll be considering the deletion of meanings
that is observed in that discourse. In adition, we will do some considerations about
embarrassments imposed by the form as the space is structured. Our attention will be directed to
the urban barriers that embarrass, in way, socially differentiated the articulation of places and,
consequently, in the perception of the space for the different social segments.

RESULTS

In the material selected for analysis, we detached two discursive places in that the
Municipal Government is put to speak with his public, depend of the object of the
communication. In the first, this actor presents the area of the Bom Retiro and its history. His
discourse presents marks of an assumed neutrality, as if a trying to hide the social place that
occupies. In the second discourse type, this place appears clearly more defined. The City hall is
put clearly in the defense of an intervention project; very away it hides its ideological positions.

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 It interests us in matter to understand the relationship among the two discoursees and as,
in spite of if they send to areas no coincident, they converge in the reference to the some
elements of the built landscape. Such convergence will better be observed in the omissions of
historical heritage of certain groups and in the deletion of the historical meaning of places and
constructions, when of their reterritorialization. In this sense, initially we detach a passage in
that this actor exposes the motivations of the Nova Luz project:
“The Nova Luz will radically change, for much better, object of one of
the largest urban interventions accomplished already in São Paulo, the
Nova Luz involves 225 hectares of an area approximately before
stigmatized like "Cracolândia." The resources for the first expropriations
were already liberated by the City hall. The project in execution intends
to create an exemplary area, new and bold, that while it creates new
home options and new public equipments, it preserves the existent
architectural patrimony, it respects and it stimulates the economical
vocation of the area (.) and it opens horizons for new segments”. (São
Paulo, 2009)
In texts like this one, we have an enunciator that puts himself in the social place of a
reformer. It builds this place in the reference to a degraded area. It reinforces this condition,
when it extends to every perimeter the “cracolândia” (crackland); common nickname in the
local press, due the intense movement of drug traffic observed in some points of the area. As a
reformer, he uses good part of the document to tell the closings of bars, hotels and restaurants
and associates them to the prostitution and bad sanitary conditions. He still describes actions
that seek the children's protection. These elements build an image of a lacking area attempt to
legitimate the Municipal Government in the role of its main reformer.
In another context, such engagement is more distant. With a relative neutrality, the
Neighborhood is presented in a way that tangency the nationalism. It emphasizes some linked
images to the past of the Bom Retiro, as the one of shelter or multiethnic cauldron. The cultural
diversity present there is largely valued in this discourse. However, there are constant references
to an occupation by immigrants and their subordinate position in the local society. The text
detaches the impact in the landscape of an area,that was occupied for segments of the elite in the
past:

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 “The second foundation has registration in the neoclassical big houses
of the wide boulevards of the luxurious Campos Elíseos and in its
imposing constructions, as the Palace of the Campos Elíseos , built in
1899 by farmer Elias Chaves, and that it was used as residence of
governors and Headquarter of the State Government , between 1912
and 1965. Today, each ghost of barons of coffee lives together, in the
old mansions transformed at slums, with numerous families, that of so
concerned with the space lack, the precarious conditions of hygiene, the
rent to be paid” (…) (São Paulo, 2009)
There is a tendency of minimizing the cultural diversity at Bom Retiro. The identities are
ignored largely. The marks of the history of the groups that formed are reduced to their tourist
potential. This is unfolded in the attribution of a character of suburban cosmopolitism to the
Neighborhood. Then the speaker highlights a contrast with the more valued areas of the city,
where we can find the real cosmopolitism. There is a moment in the discourse in which the
cultural diversity is solved by the substitution of a group for other. It also symbolizes the change
of an economical vocation for other. In consequence, the idea of a necessary modernization of
the Neighborhood is reinforced and, paradoxically, a new group of immigrants will be the
answer for modernizing and recovering the Neighborhood:
“The aggravation of the poverty and of the social problems they are the reverses of the
most recent reinvention of the Bom Retiro and of São Paulo. The neighborhood, that
there is a lot is reference in the textile trade, it won the status of pole of the industry of
the fashion. In the years 1980, the Jews started to sell the stores that had in the Bom
Retiro. (...) which were bought by Koreans. The Korean immigration had their first
steps in Brazil in 1963, but was concentrated on the years 1980. As well as the Jews,
they were favored for the compatriots that arrived before and they established
churches, schools and addressed services. What before was family trade, it turned a
business structure. (.). Nowadays, the Bom Retiro is practically a Korean
neighborhood. They represent about 70% of the 1.200 companies of the Bom Retiro,
according to data of the Chamber of the Leading Shopkeepers of the neighborhood.
The Koreans changed the physiognomy and the spirit of the area, but not its soul. It
continues being one of the best retreats for who ventures to do São Paulo.” (São Paulo,
2009, our griffins).
Above we defended the idea that the discourse has an equivalent one in the urban
drawing. In great measure this can be apprehended in the form as the space is organized and it
imposes some itineraries alike (already-said) and it hinders or it impedes others (non-said). In

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the tourist activity, the image that is projected for the area extends to the identification of
circuits and defined articulation of the marks of the landscape. Among these, some exist as
proposal, others are produced by the own urban drawing. In this level, we should still consider
elements that serve as barrier for the free to flow of the itineraries. In the analogy that we do
with the Discourse Analysis, such barriers will constitute form of interdiction that they convert
the articulation among places an non-said one for individuals considered in specific social
places.
Let us take the example of the Luz Station. The Art gallery of the State of São Paulo and
the Luz Park were its neighbors. The decision of government organs to install Portuguese
Language Museum in their dependences served to the articulation of these places in a space
returned to the tourism. This is located in turn of an area that serves as place of parking of cars
and bus of tourism. This space shows the influence of the urban drawing in the induction or
blockades in the use of some places. It is closed for that weren’t dedicated to the activity of
cultural tourism . It contributes for so much, a busy avenue that difficults the connection with
the area that locates on its opposite side. The Museum, even working at the same building of the
rail station, works as barrier for who uses the public transportation. There is no conection
between its exit and the Museum entrance. Besides, the remaining of the road system isolates
the spaces of the stores and residences of the Bom Retiro. Not totally, it is true, in the measure
in that it is still noticed the use of the Luz Park by the population of the Neighborhood even of
other areas of the city.

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 However, even with some safeguards, we can identify the convergence between the
discourse of the official organs and the urban drawing. Questioned as cultural tourist, who
arrives to that area will travel a circuit prescribed already - an already-said -, induced so much
by the publicity as by the urban drawing. The non-said is related to the difficulty that the
structuring of the space puts for walking through the external areas the this small portion of the
territory.
On the other hand, same the possible circuits are absentees in the official discourse. Let
us take the example of the Israeli-Brazilian Cultural Institute , one of the many sociability
spaces that the Jewish community built in the Bom Retiro. Joan Bahia detaches the creation of
associations as this in Latin-American cities for Jewish militants, with origin in Bund and in
European communist parties. The experience in São Paulo is summarized in the following way:
“In São Paulo, in the same decade (of 1920), the Tsukunft (future) club was founded in
the neighborhood of Bom Retiro by immigrants originating from of Bund. They
developed cultural and political activities. In the years 1930, it passed to call itself
Yugend Club (the youth's club) and it was founded a library, a theater group, called
Dramkrais, and the choir Schaeffer. In the years 1940, the entity passed calls itself
Center of Culture and Progress, which integrated the Idisch Kultur Farband (ICUF). In
1953, it was inaugurated the Palace of the Culture building, also called of House of the
People, that is, the Instituto Cultural Israelita Brasileiro (ICIB),” (Israeli-Brazilian
Culture Institute) “a homage to the six million Jews victims of the Holocaust. After
this period the Colégio Scholem Aleichem (CSA),” (Scholem Aleichem School) “the
Federal Israeli-Brazilian Association (AFIB), the club I Peretz and the colony of
vacations Kinderland started to work in the facilities of ICIB. In 1960, the Teatro de
Arte Israelita Brasileiro (TAIB)” (Israeli-Brazilian Art Theater) “was inaugurated”.
(BAHIA, 2009)
The Institute can be characterized as a type of urban stain, in the measure which it
sheltered a group of associations related to the Jewish sociability. We cannot isolate its sense of
an political ideology and a of historical heritage. However, different from the another stain (the
museums environment) it is not considered in the official policies of preservation. They intend
articulations to interfere in the reading of that space. The non recognition of the articulation of
activities and senses that happened in that small stain, leads to forms of appropriation of their
fragments, reterritorializing them, when some of its fragments are enrolled in a new circuit.
In ceremony of inauguration of a dance school, the Governor of the State, José Serra,
expressed the following:

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 “Finally, here there is also Taib, the old Teatro Israelita Brasileiro, which the
Municipal Secretary of the Culture wants to transform in a theater school.Without
speaking here, naturally, of the Sala Paulo Paulo and of Osesp,” (Symphony orchestra
of the State of São Paulo) “the building in which we are, Escola Tom Jobim.” (SERRA
2008)
In future, Taib will be integrated into another circuit, composed by centers of artistic
formation. This was made possible only by a process of fragmentation of the space.
Desterritorialized, the theater can be enrolled in a new sistem, in which its significance for the
collective memory of a group will be deleted. This is the condition to speak to another public.”.

FINAL CONSIDERATIONS

We used the observable example in a Latin-American metropolis with the first objective
of describing a process for which its historical patrimony is reterritorialized. In this, the impact
of the tourist industry plays an important role in the deletion of the sense that they had for the
collective memory of groups and in its ressignification. The official agencies have been
contributing in this process, be omitting theirselves in the preservation than it doesn't have
interest to economical goals, be in the interventions of particularized constructions, in that the
sense of the set of which they were part is hidden.
What was observed in relation to the Jewish community can be extended to all colonies
that formed that neighborhood. Its cultural diversity is considered as "suburban cosmopolitism”,
close to its total ignorance. Although the Jewish community gather about 8% of the population
of the Bom Retiro, the Neighborhood is presented as Korean. This is necessary a new social
representation of the area, considering the identification of this people with this process of
modernization.
Any way, we noticed how this community of immigrants is suffering with the projects of
recovering of the central area of São Paulo. Strictly speaking, it does not mean just a verbal
construction. It is unfolded in the way as the space is organized. In this level, we considered
pertinent to approximate the approach of the urban design of the Discourse Analysis. We
noticed, then, that both can be analyzed in terms of the set of possibilities of the relationships
that build. In the discourse and in the map, we found a group of possibilities of articulations of
points of the space. We also found impediments that isolate areas and, like this, they restrict the
sense that it can assume.

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 We also noticed that the possibilities are not the same to everybody. They depend on the
social place of who uses the space and their representation in the speaker-planner's discourse-
map. Who arrives to the area of the Museums in the Bom Retiro is cloistered in place, which
was closed with the conversion of a part of rail station in the Museum of Portuguese Language,
what difficults the communication between that space cutting and its exterior. This last one
dedicated to the daily activities.
Finally, still considering the proposals of the inclusion of a traditional Jewish theater in a
new circuit, we could extract some conclusions regarding the deletion of its historical historical,
when isolated of the group in that was formed. In this sense, we defended that recovery projects
frequently are made to the costs of the fragmentation of the urban landscape, with the deletion
of its historical meaning.

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Rio de Janeiro: Editora UFRJ, 1997
CERTEAU, Michel de. L'invention du quotidien. Paris: Union générale d'éditions, 1980
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