Territories of Mediation

Shared Existences in the Brazilian Amazon

Master thesis (2021)

Authors

Lucas Di Gioia Architecture and the Built Environment

Contributors

T. Kuzniecow Bacchin Urban Design - Architecture and the Built Environment (supervisor 1)
D.A. Sepulveda Carmona Spatial Planning and Strategy - Architecture and the Built Environment (supervisor 2)
Faculty
Architecture and the Built Environment
Copyright: © 2021 Lucas Meneses Di Gioia Ferreira
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Published Date

01-07-2021

Language

English

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Faculty

Architecture and the Built Environment

Abstract

The Xingu River Basin sits within the Amazon Biome and integrates its deforestation belt. It is home to a multitude of endemic species and indigenous nations which are now threatened by the disruption of the river’s water pulse caused by the construction and operation of the Belo Monte Hydroelectric Dam. As we face our planet’s ecological collapse due to resource based developmentalism, life on a planetary scale is increasingly threatened. Under the Anthropocene, urbanization networks have expanded beyond the traditional concept of hinterland. Planetary urbanization theory (Brenner & Schmid, 2012) unravels how untouched regions are now operationalized and incorporated into global resource networks.

The project explores the possibilities for mediation between natural and local-social systems with the demands of development brought by modernity to the river’s basin, specifically to the areas directly affected by reduced water flow caused by the dam. Traditionally, Amazon rivers are spaces that allow for shared occupation. By considering water as the meditative space, forms of shared occupation are proposed which can enable a reconfiguration for coexistence and forms of life in the Xingu River according to varied worldviews. This sensitive approach towards local existences looks for a type of urbanization different from that of the modern project. In order to identify potential synchronicities between worldviews, a framework for reading worldview alignments regarding the systems in question was developed.

This thesis questions the limits of urban practice in such territories, posing a question that possibly cannot be answered with the tools we have at our disposal. If our field intends to position itself within such territories, we must begin to propose an alternative paradigm which can adequately territorialize cosmopolitics. Would Cosmourbanism be achievable?

Brenner, N. & Schmid, C. (2012). Planetary Urbanization. In M. Gandy (Eds.), Urban Constellations (pp. 10-13). Berlin: Jovis.