Occupation & City: The Proto-Urbanism of Urban Movements in Central São Paulo

Central São Paulo is concurrently the site, subject and in part the incessantly provisional product of myriad occupations. This project inquires whether and how such occupation practices perform instances of a latent proto-urbanism, considering the manifold ways in which they interact with the architecture of the city. Operating on the intersection of urbanism and anthropology, the project seeks coming to terms with the vicissitudes of the constructed man-made urban environment vis-à-vis social and cultural practices. The project therefore develops (1) an urban analysis of the urban ecology of central São Paulo as it developed into a vastly occupied territory, (2) an empirical spatial analysis of particular instances of proto-urbanism on the basis of the cases of Teatro Oficina and FLM (Frente de Luta por Moradia), and (3) a set of theoretical propositions that seeks to define the proto-urban project as a significant urban phenomenon.