Suburbanization in Rio de Janeiro: Reflections of the Constructed Identity in the Configuration of Engenho Novo

Abstract

This article aims to reflect about the role of the historical processes in the construction of suburban identities at the Metropolis of Rio de Janeiro, and the influence of urban configuration in the constitution of identities values in the carioca suburbs. It also intends to demonstrate how the carioca suburban concept differs from the geographical notion of suburb. It is based in the idea that to identify the dynamics formalized in the space it is necessary to interpret general and particular historical processes through visions and interactions in the macroscale; and to understand the effect of the spatial dimension in the urban dynamics, avoiding or promoting human actions. Thus it recovers historical moments of the metropolitan structure, revises the construction of the concept of carioca suburb carioca through time and analyse specificities of the process of constitution of a part of Engenho Novo, a pioneer suburb in Rio de Janeiro, observing how its identity is constructed. As conclusion, we evaluate the singularities of Engenho Novo as a place, besides its insertion in the whole of the carioca suburbs – commenting about solutions that historically and spatially distinguish it, and common traces that creates a unicity of the suburban identity. In this dialectic it is possible to observe a potentiality that can be reverted into a search for a better urban quality of life. This case study comprehends a research that investigate others suburban territories of the Metropolis of Rio de Janeiro.