Third Landscape - Urbanization in the Amazon (Research Profile)

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Third Landscape URBANIZATION IN THE AMAZON FEW W EEKS Anna Dietzsch 1s

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“ R O Ç A” 1. EXTENSIVE URBANIZATION

2. BOUND TO THE LAND 3. OTHER IMAGINARIES T 4. FOREST MAN AGE M E NCITIES 5. DRY AND WET CITIES 6. APPOINTMENTS FOR A FOREST CITY CATALOGUE 7. CONTACTS, STAKEHOLDERS AND ACADEMIC PROJECT CENARIOS 8. PAST AND FUTURE RESEARCH: ATTEMPTS IN RETHINKING URBAN DEVELOPMENT MODELS FOR A FOREST CITY 1 Sao Gabriel da Cachoeira - Amazonas 9. PAST AND FUTURE RESEARCH: ATTEMPTS IN RETHINKING URBAN DEVELOPMENT MODELS FOR A FOREST CITY 2 Ipawu - Mato Grosso 10. PAST AND FUTURE RESEARCH: ATTEMPTS IN RETHINKING URBAN DEVELOPMENT MODELS FOR A FOREST CITY 3 Tenondé-Porã

1. EXTENSIVE URBANIZATION

1 Lefebvre, H. (1970). The Urban Revolution, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, London, 2003

In 1970, Henri Lefebvre1 poses the idea that the “total urbanization of society” is an inevitable process, which will demand new interpretive and perceptual approaches.

Indeed, not even fifty years later we are experiencing fast growing rates of urbanization, with more than half of the world population already living in urban centers. But this is only one facet of the process and we need to go beyond cities to understand its real impact as a global phenomenon. Modern ecological crisis and urbanization should be understood under the light of the dialectics between nature and capital in the longterm.

Consumption levels in our modern cities demand supplies from far-away sources, resulting in a global flux of commodities and materials, which affects territories with no apparent relation to urban spatial, social or economic patterns. One example is the Amazon region, which has been systematically integrated into the logic of urban growth with pressing global demand for its natural resources. Today, the Amazon is interconnected with Brazilian cities like Sao Paulo and Brasilia, as much as it is with other global cities like Tokyo, Montreal or Beijing.

THE AMAZON IN THE ALUMINUM GEOGRAPHY

150M ton

Aluminum primary

1.5M ton

OSLO Hydro 0.6M ton

1982 NORWAY PRODUCTION PRIMARY ALUMINUM

5M ton

1982

MONTREAL Rio Tinto Alcan P NYC P Alcoa

2015

BEIJING Brazilian iron largest importer

1982

2014

2014

6M ton

50M ton

# ## # # # # ## # ## # ## # #### ###

120M ton

2015 RIO DE JANEIRO Vale

P P

Aluminum primary Alumina Bauxite

Sources: USGS Mineral Statistics; BGS Minerals; BNDES; Anuario Mineral DNPM ; Japan Aluminum Association

1982 BRAZIL PRODUCTION

Image: The Amazon in the Aluminum Geography

By Andrea Margit

2 Marx, K., Capital, Volume III, translated by David Fernbach. New York and London: Penguin Books 3 Foster, J. B., Marx’s theory of mabolic rift: classical foundations for environmental sociology. American journal of sociology,

2014 JAPAN PRODUCTION (commodity and manufacture)

Manufactured Alumina and aluminum primary Bauxite

1982 BRAZIL EXPORTS

1982 USA PRODUCTION

P

Shipment aluminum products Production Aluminum primary Production Alumina

1982 20M ton

Aluminium primary Alumina Bauxite

10M ton

2014 CHINA PRODUCTION

P TOKYO Nippon Aluminum

Aluminum primary Alumina

CANADA PRODUCTION

Aluminum primary Alumina Bauxite

P

2014

Aluminum primary Alumina Bauxite

1982

SAO PAULO Albras/CBA

MELBOURNE BHP Billiton LEGEND: Brasilia - Federal District # Bauxite deposits/aluminum facilities

2014 AUSTRALIA PRODUCTION

P

## ### Carajas Mining Complex

Largest bauxite deposits

The above diagram illustrates the fluxes of one commodity found in the Amazon, aluminum. Global pressure pushes the concession of mineral extraction zones, which are followed by infrastructure for production and transportation, including highways, railways, pipelines, ports, hydroelectric power-plants, refineries, forging plants and cities, with great social and environmental impact.

The idea of a binary separation between rural and urban produced by industrialization has become increasingly blurred and we need to understand the complex and interconnected systems that appear between one and the other in the process of capital and spatial production. Already in the second English agricultural revolution (18151880), the depletion of natural resources and soil was evident, with the growth of soil chemistry and the use of fertilizers as further factors for long-term damage. As Karl Marx’s2 metabolic rift3 becomes greater, different gradients of urbanization fill in the globe.

On the social level, when the recomposition of natural resources becomes secondary, the benefits of an ever-growing urbanization become short-term for the extraction areas, usually favoring a handful of people to the detriment of the environment and traditional populations. The gap between production and consumption also weakens the awareness of the original sources and it becomes difficult to trace the fluxes of raw material. The overall result is the deepening of economic differences, environmental imbalances, and

the dismantling of traditional populations and local representation, which were formed to respond to local disruptions but cannot cope with global instabilities.

Picture: Armed conflict between the GuaraniCaiowá Indians and farmers are a constant in Mato Grosso do Sul, where agro-business is constantly challenging the Indigenous right to the land

By Spensy Pimentel (http://tekoaguarani.blogspot.com/ 2012/06/)disputa-entre-indios-e-fazendeiros-no.html

As fluxes in the global economy intensify, urbanization advances deeper into “natural realms” and we observe the disintegration of border territories through changes in ecological systems, weak governments and social violence. With urbanization taking over, we will have to fully acknowledge the interdependency between natural and urban environments if we want to work within the realm of an ecological urbanism. The phenomenon of extensive urbanization, and its social consequences beyond urbanized areas, requires extensive responsibility and deep transformations in the way we plan and design our landscapes. We will need to transition from a perpetual response to emergency situations to a long-term vision that nevertheless is not standardized, but specific, interdependent and aligned with new technologies that are relevant to local context.

Picture: Agro-business increased deforestation in the Amazon by 24% in 2015

(http://www.acheiusa.com/Noticia/desmatamentona-amazonia-sobe-24-em-2015-mostram-dados-doinpe-39260/)

Image: Mapping of deflorestation in the Amazon region

(http://imazon.org.br/slide/esmatamento/?lang=en)

2. BOUND TO THE LAND

If the intrinsic logic of our modern living and urban production under capitalism relies on the contradictory and self-destroying cycles of maximum consumption, production and depleted resources, should we look beyond modernity to see if there are other lessons to be learned? Are there alternative forms of landscapes that can gives us clues to “another kind of urbanization”?

One point of departure may be to look at the societies of traditional populations we have disregarded in our cruise to progress. If their paradigms are different from ours, maybe their solutions could enlighten the way we think our own. But for that to happen we have to acknowledge the possibility that modern society is not the only viable or credible existing social system and that technology, economic progress and reliance on a monetary system are not “fundamental truths”.

⁴ Taylor, Charles , Modern Social Imaginaries, Duke University Press, 2004

Charles Taylor, in his book “Modern Social Imaginaries”4 coins the term “social imaginary” to explain the “intrinsic grasp” of our social environment and its reality, pointing to the existence of a “moral order” that underlies our political and economic structures: “Implicit in this understanding of the norms is the ability to recognize ideal cases (e.g., an election in which each citizen exercised to the maximum his or her judgment autonomously, in which everyone was heard). And beyond the ideal stands some notion of a moral or metaphysical order, in the context of which the norms and ideas make sense.”

Image: Privately owned Land in Brazil

In Nexo Journal https://www.nexojornal.com.br/

Picture: Indigenous people protest in Brasilia

By Valter Campanato, Agência Brasil

In other words, our modern order is the one we may take for granted, or (un)consciously believe in, but it is not by any means the only possible one.

⁵ Gibson-Graham, J.K., A Postcapitalist Politics, University of Minnesota, 2006 6

7

Castells, M., Informational City, Wiley Blackwell, 1992

Solnit, Rebecca, A Hope in the Dark, Nation Books, 2004

Picture: Indians protest in Brasilia

By Antonio Cruz, Agência Brasil

Innumerous traditional communities, as well as disenfranchised ones, although imbedded in the reality of global economy, have found ways to live within different sets of values all over the world. Different imaginaries, or different “political imaginaries”, as Gibson-Graham have called them, are not fantasies or naïve discourse, but rather forms of alternative economic organizations that currently exist - “politics of possibilities”5 that locally define their own internal rules.

As Castells6 pointed out in the 90’s, if the internet made the globalization of the production economy possible, it could also create a platform for the connection of local voices. Grounded in the reality of local possibilities and constraints, these voices can guide us in the conversation of what our regional and global designs for the Amazon could be.

“The embrace of local power doesn’t have to mean parochialism, withdrawal, or intolerance, only a coherent foundation from which to navigate the larger world. From the wild coalitions of the global justice movement to the cowboys and environmentalists sitting down together there is an ease with difference that doesn’t need to be eliminated, a sense that . . . you can have an identity embedded in local circumstances and a role in the global dialogue. And that this dialogue exists in service of the local. (2004, 113)”.7

3. OTHER IMAGINARIES

8 Heckenberger, Michael, et all, Amazonia 1942: Pristine Forest or Cultural Parkland?, Science Magazine, Vol.30, 2003

Three thousand years before Europeans arrived in Brazil, Brazilian Indians lived in a web of spread-out civilizations that covered the country’s whole surface. Opposing the view of a “naïf civilization”, or a “pre-civilization”, several studies show us today that they were organized in quite intricate and elaborate ways. Michael Heckenberger, from the University of Florida, describes the occupation of the Amazonian Upper Xingu area, comparing it to Ebenezer Howard’s Garden City model8: “Rather than ancient cities, complex settlement patterns in the Upper Xingu were characterized by a network of permanent plaza communities integrated in territorial polities (~250 km2). This dispersed, multicentric pattern of plaza towns (~20 to 50 ha) and villages (<10 ha) was organized in a nested hierarchy, which gravitated toward an exemplary political ritual center. We refer to these hierarchical supralocal communities as galactic clusters, inspired by Tambiah’s “galactic polity” model, which draws attention to the basic similarities between small-to-large centers and the “radial mapping” of satellites in relation to an exemplary center. The galactic clusters existed within a regional peer polity composed of geographically and socially articulated but independent polities that shared basic features of techno-economy, sociopolitical organization, and ideology.”

According to Heckenberger, these polities were responsible for the domestication of the forest. Vast areas that we today assume are “pristine natural forests” were really planted and managed landscapes, indicating a high degree of “manufacturing” and yet great balance in the coexistence of man and forest.

Image (left): Modern Kuikuro village of Kuhikugu in Xingu, Amazon

(http://alwestmeditates.blogspot.ca/2013/09/theecology-of-power-by-michael.html)

Image (right): Mapping of polities

Heckenberger, Michael, et all, Amazonia 1942: Pristine Forest or Cultural Parkland?, Science Magazine, Vol.30, 2003

Image (below): map of archeological sites with “black soil” found in the Amazon Region

By Andrea Margit, Amazon Imaginaries, Graduate School of Design, 2017 ARCHEOLOGICAL SITES IN THE AMAZON RIVER BASIN

Data sources: Tamanaha, E.; Neves, E.; Arqueotrop Lab; and Levis et al.

To the left is a map that shows the extension of archeological sites found in the Amazon River Basin. Man-made trenches and the presence of “black soil” point to the existence of human settlements spread all over the Amazon.

The Amazonian forest stands on a thin layer of nutritious soil, as part of a fragile balance of natural processes that allow the system to survive interdependently. By ignoring the complexity of its functioning as a sophisticated superimposition of specific elements and conditions, modern agriculture cannot reproduce the fertility of the original soil in the long term and many of its attempts have collapsed.

The discourse of “integrating” the Amazon into the economic logic of the country, and ultimately global capital, will be a failed experiment in the long run. Cities and rural settlements that were implemented in the region since the seventies along a web of highways and throughways constructed by the military regime are today the focus of great environmental disasters, pushing deforestation and fires to dangerous levels.

Am Azon ForES t: SoIl FErtI lIty

One of the world's poorest soil in mineral nutrients

One of the world’s poorest soil in mineral nutrients

nutrients recycling cycle organic debris

Picture (above): sample of “black soil” from archeological site in the Amazon. “Black Soil” is the fertile soil produced by human intervention From article “Architecture in the Anthropocene: Encounters Among Design, Deexp Time Science and Philosophy”, by Paulo Tavares

Image (right): The Amazon forest relies on a balanced interrelationship of natural systems.

One of them is the efficient link between debris, funghi and roots

organic material decomposition

nutrients resorption

Mycorrhizal (fungi and roots link): High nutrients resorption

By Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

LANDSCAPE The political inclination of the current federal government to further THIRD advance with this strategy adds a level of urgency to the Amazonian issue that we have not seen since the 60’s, when its indigenous population was considered “extinguished”.

9

Andrea Margit, Amazon Imaginaries, Graduate School of Design, 2017

Image(below): A. Margit - information collected from authors: Heckenberger, Neves, Clement and Levis

In contrast, “By creating gradients of forests that mutually activated each other – the riparian buffer, the orchard, the managed forest and the gardens –these [indigenous] societies have avoided soil deterioration and could [can] therefore develop complex social relations and durable places of habitation.“ 9 Below is a section through a pre-Colombian Indian settlement, according to modern archeological discoveries.

These spatial arrangements are imbedded in a social imaginary that is different than ours and that, in admittedly oversimplified ways, will be here described by the pinpoint of four characteristics: fluidity, kinship, cultural territory and subsistence. In this imaginary, patterns of flexibility, cohesion between man and nature and a non-hierarquical connection between socio-economic practices, natural cycles and cultural traits form a cohesive system that I have called the Circular Culture:

Image: In Circular Culture, Man, Divine and Nature coexist in a non-axial relationship

By Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

1. Fluidity: In Latin American indigenous mythology, nature and humans are bound by a “common spirit”. Our bodies and forms are transitional, pertaining to a world that is “all people”. The Brazilian anthropologist Viveiros de Castro borrowed from German philosophy to coin the term Amerindian Perspectivism10 to explain this way of seeing things. As he points out, under this perspective relations are always formed between subjects, with no subdued objects, be it between humans, or between humans and non-humans. In this world, the separation between nature and human (metabolic rift) diminishes.

Co-related notions extend to ideas of fluid time and fluid space, where boundaries are related to natural elements and events, rather than to abstract concepts of time or property. Acknowledging their importance in the structural organization of things, rivers acquire the status of deities, being the most important elements of continuity, both as means of transportation, as well as means of subsistence; 2. Kinship: Since the Enlightenment, when theories of natural rights11 started to shape modern man as owner of his own, individual rights, we have valued individuality above community, disassociating both as opposing values. In Indigenous social organization, individuals are intertwined with the idealization of the group and its traditions. In some communities the symbiosis between the two is such, that political forces are horizontalized and apparently “non-hierarchical”, relying on an organic understanding of practices.12

Image: Everything is interchangeable

By Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

Picture: Araweté men coming back from a hunt

By Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, in Araweté, um Povo Tupi da Amazonia

10 Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, Os Pronomes Cosmológicos e o Perspectivismo Ameríndio, 1996 (http://www.scielo.br/pdf/mana/v2n2/ v2n2a05.pdf) 11 See John Locke, Thomas Aquina, Voltaire and others 12 As reference, see example of the Areweté people, described by Eduardo Viveiros de Castro in Areweté, Um Povo Tupi na Amazonia, Edições SESC, 2015 13 As reference, see example of the Guayaki described by Pierre Clasters in Le Societe Contre L'État, 1974

As pointed out by Pierre Clasters in his book Society Against the State, Brazilian Indigenous societies rely on a political structure with no coercion, where the figure of the leader is important and respected, but has no freedom to decide for the group.

In periods of peace, leaders act as mediators, peacemakers and providers, and are constantly put in check by the group. “Greed and power are incompatible; to be a chief it is necessary to be generous.”13 3. Cultural Territory: Without prescriptive boundaries (therefore fluid), the indigenous territory is defined by historical occupation, use and the capacity of those who occupy (and define) it to defend its natural resources. Boundaries are not open, but are porous, and there is strong interdependence between man and land in both the symbolic and physical aspects. Culture and territory are interrelated in defining each other.

4. Subsistance: In a social logic that doesn’t aim for accumulation, all concepts of modern capitalism are subverted; individual supremacy, objectification of relationships and commodification of values are questioned. The construction and management of inhabited landscapes and “cities” will also obviously differ from ours;

Picture: Indigenous communities are imbedded and active in national politics, representing an important safeguard to the natural ecosystem they inhabit

By Mário Vilela/Funai

14 Guedde, P., Cities in Evolution, Williams and Norgate, 1915 (https://archive.org/details/citiesinevolutio00gedduoft/page/n9) 15 As reference, see: "The Resurgence of Regional Design", by Neuman and Zonneveld, 2018 and "Regionalisation: Probing the urban landscape of the Great Lakes Regio",

by Pierre Belanger

TI

2%

20%

Image (above): deforestation can be up to 11 times smaller in Brazilian Indigenous territories, than in private owned land

By Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

Image (right): Rivers are the elements of continuity and renewal. Important connectors and sources of food

By Anna Dietzsch and Clara Morgenroth

Turning to Indigenous communities to understand the forest and how we should relate to it as we deal with different degrees of urbanization and extraction patterns, will allow us to question the socio-political parameters that are now threatening the natural balance of the whole Amazonian system, as it could guide us to a more holistic approach where natural, cultural and economical realities intersect, much in tune to what Sir Patrick Geddes practiced 100 years ago,14 and what “regionalism thinking” currently advocates.15 It is relevant to notice that this is not only a theoretical or academic proposition, but also a very practical one, as these communities are very much imbedded and active in the Brazilian political life, with strong connections to a global web of institutions and governments. The 1988 Brazilian Constitution guaranteed the preservation of their livelihood and laid the framework for the demarcation of Indigenous Territories, which today occupy 13% of Brazil’s total area, if we only account for those already legally established. Ninety percent of these lands are in the Amazonian biomes and together are a real safeguard for the natural environment.

4. FOREST CITIES

16

See: Thomas Lovejoy's interview in Revista FAPESP, International Issue, Dec. 2016

Urbanization in the Amazon is not an isolated phenomenon. Main deforestation factors such as farming, mining, big infrastructure projects and timber extraction are supported by a web of cities and towns that spreads all over the region. There are more than three hundred cities with over 25K people in the Brazilian Amazon region and an equal number of smaller towns, along with the indigenous and small riverine “traditional” settlements. Today, the resiliency of the Amazonian biomes is very much intertwined with this web. As Thomas Lovejoy, "the Godfather of Biodiversity", said: “It’s not simply about what happens in the forests; it’s also about what happens in cities. The quality of life in Amazon cities is a very important part of reaching the ideal solution.”16 But in spite the lush cultural and natural environment, urban settlements in the Amazon follow patterns that are totally foreign to their contexts, mirroring urban centers of the Brazilian Southeast, the US and Europe. There is even great disregard for the forest and any traditional knowledge that comes along with it. The contradiction points to an area of great potential.

Picture: The urban grid layed-out in Soure, Pará

By Google Maps

Image: Map of cities with more than 20K people in the Brazilian Amazon. Urbanization in the Amazon comes with a huge footprint of extraction.

By Anna Dietzsch and Axelle Dechelette

I believe we could reframe the logic of urban growth in the Amazon region by associating and creating synergies between two different systems of thought and practices: the “natural” and “indigenous” one, with that of “technology” and capital production, to guarantee the continued economic and environmental resilience of the region. This would pave the way to interesting hybrid solutions – what I have called a Third Landscape, where “foreign” and “local” technologies are employed within the relevance of local context. The Amazon could become a potential laboratory for design exploration, to establish a different logic for spatial (and maybe politcal) organization, where there is a productive encounter between natural and urban environments.

Picture: Riverine cities and villages still carry strong spatial links to water, although modern urbanization patterns have ignored it

By Anna Dietzsch

Given the diversity of scale and nature of cities in the Brazilian Amazon and the sheer size and diversity of its different biomes, urbanization of the Amazonian region is a topic that lends itself to several opportunities for research and action. The different degrees of “natural” and “urban” gradients and the different manifestations of indigenous and traditional presence, with the interesting and complex spatial, cultural and political relations they create, lead to a rich environment for exploration. Research needs to be done on great urban areas in the forest, such as Manaus (3 million people) and Belem (1.5 million people), smalls enclaves of riverine settlements, or on the “dry” urbanization led by the web of highways and industrialized farming. I give some contextual examples below.

5. DRY AND WET CITIES

Urbanization in the Amazon is linked to two different vectors; the web of rivers and water basins around the Amazon River and the highway system that began to be implemented in the 70’s during the military dictatorship, in an attempt to “integrate” the Amazon region to the country’s economy and exploit its natural resources. Supported by this system, damns have been built, mines have been opened and farming has found its way into forested areas. The innumerous cities that have been founded in the process usually have no strong connection to rivers or bodies or water, but are connected through extensive use of cars and trucks and eventually by air.

The riverine cities, on the other hand, have followed the path of Indigenous occupation and are strongly connected to rivers. Even in the largest urban centers, like Manaus or Belem, one can see the traces of this connection in the traditional ways people build their homes and infrastructure. In Macapa, for example, rivers substitute some of the grid streets, whereas in Belem, patches of forest interrupt the dense urban fabric and form a web of “spontaneous” public spaces. Below are some examples of these footprints.

Tefe, AM (60K people) sits at the confluence of the Tefe River and The Amazon River and is an important trading center in its region. The central fish and fruit market sits by and in the Tefe River and is the main commercial place for all of the small riverine communities in the area. Palafitas, floating retail and homes indicate the traditional connection to the river. But the low-income federal housing complexes are built of foreign material, following the rigid grid imposed by the industrial, modern city, with no connection to the water.

Images by Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

Images above: diagram of historic (indigenous) riverine cities along the Amazon River and of highway system established in the 70's Images by Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

tefe

soure

Images of Soure, PA (above) and of Manaus, AM (below) Images from web (no identified source) and by Anna Dietzsch

Soure, PA (25K people) sits on the Amazon River estuary, where tides vary significantly during the year. The juxtaposition of the urban, orthogonal, bare grid, and the natural wetland forest has brought together two different ways of living. Indegenous stilt wood houses and aerial foot-bridges are built over the landscape, while brick and mortar buildings populate the grid that has surpressed the vegetation and is prone to flooding several times a year. Buffalos are used in Soure as means of transportation, although no one can clearly explain how the non-indigenous species appeared in the area.

Manaus, the capital of Amazon State (3 million people), has an ambiguous relationship to the water, relying on it for low-income and cargo transportation and for privatized leisure, but ignoring it as an important urban space. Nonetheless, floating house enclaves still remind us of the Floating City neighborhood which once had 15,000 inhabitants and was destroyed in the 60's. Like most of the local fishes, these houses will leave the Solimoes River and go up smaller streams when tides are low.

Manaus

Macapa, the capital of Amapa State, has a population of almost 500.000 people. Once an important source of magnesium, its economy now revolves around its port and its free-trade zone, at the estuary of the Amazon River. Although a riverine city, with strong influence by surrounding waters, it is not cognoscente of its context. Macapa is prone to constant flooding and epidemic surges, caused by the lack of sanitation (only 28% of dwellings are connected to proper sewage system). Nevertheless, traditional “palafitas” (stilts) are common in the poorer, more “spontaneous” areas of the city.

Inland channels also substitute streets in some areas, with floating infrastructure for transportation, commercial and residential uses.

Image below: In riverine cities and towns along the Amazon region, traditional houses are built on stilts and walkways connect them, forming neighborhoods that can co-exist with changing water tides. It is not uncommon for waters to rise and drop 8 to 15m during the year along rivers like the Black or Solimoes River.

Detail from town of Afua, PA, by Axelle Dechelette and Anna Dietzsch

MACAPA

6. APPOINTMENTS FOR A FOREST CITY CATALOGUE

17 See: Monte-Mor, Roberto, "Extended Urbanization in the Brazilian Amazonia", in ResearchGate.net

"The urban phenomenon has reached Brazil’s farthest and wildest frontier, gone into forested areas and produced a variety of social processes and spatial forms. The new socio-spatial relations thus produced combine apparently oppositional spaces—the jungle and the urban tissue—and are currently being (re)construed in everyday sociospatial practices under the hegemonic logic that emanates from Brazil’s urban-industrial forces centered in its metropolitan areas." 17 Despite the fact that the Amazon region is still largely perceived as a forest, or a rural region, the process of extensive urbanization is rapidly changing its socio-spatial forms, with disastrous environmental consequences. But while the urban-industrial economy dictates an hegemonic logic of development in the region, it also encounters strong local logics, defined by different combinations of “time-space-societies”, resulting in a myriad of urban forms and specific micro-regional organizations that defy our predefinitions of “rural” and “urban”, to engender hybrid forms of city-country and sociospatial relations.

The emergence and proliferation of this “new urbanization” has engendered research in many fields of thought, such as in sociology, anthropology and economics, but architects and urbanists have mainly been absent from the discussion. This research aims to start a graphic inquiry about the territorial and spatial qualities of this process to establish a framework for an Urban Lexicon of the Forest. It aims to shift the spatial discourse about the Amazon from the macro-scale planning and environmental approaches, to a more tangible, graphic and spatial related critic, based on drawings and mapping. One that architects can mostly contribute to but has not yet been done.

Patterns of Occupation: Manaus (AM), Novo Horizonte (MT), Parantins (AM), Ilha do Marajo (PA), Iauarete (AM), Yamado (AM), Paragominas (MT), Farming sttlements along Rio Cajai (PA), Breves (MT), Caracarai (RR), Altamira (PA), Rio Maiá (AM)

peixoto azevedo, mt

Peixoto Azevedo, MT (34K people), is a typical example of what I am calling a “dry city”, being part of the urbanization process facilitated by the highway system started by the militaries in the 70's.

The town grew exponentially when gold was found in the area and today survives from agriculture. The shape of the municipality follows the logic of power: land is demarcated (sometimes illegally) according to rules of extraction - farming and mining.

Peixoto Azevedo is located in the transitional forests of Central Brazil, where forests and savannas form a rich ecological system that helps safeguard the lush rain forest further North. Nonetheless, almost half of its area has been deforested for farming and its "preserved" area is the result of the superimposition of its municipal boundaries and those of a preserved federal park, so environmental requirements "are met".

The town itself is located as far away as possible from preserved land and is directly connected to the conurbation of farms and villages formed by the agricultural frontier of soy and cattle, of which its part of. It occupies an insignificant portion of the municipal area, which is greater than 14 million square meters, but nonetheless it is undeniably its decision making platform and communication center, its political connection to State and Federal powers.

Farms are opened in the forest without supervision and many times illegally. Deforestation occurs for timber extraction and the bare land is then populated with cattle to guarantee the its possession, and is usually legalized after some years of "use". Industrialized monoculture is the last phase in the cycle of occupation.

Images by Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

Images of extraction patterns show evidence of the urbanization logic of the region. Municipal districts are formed around environmentally preserved areas, or indigenous territories, so they can claim they meet Federal standards of preservation, while they encroach these areas, drying up important water sources and diminishing humidity to dangerous levels. Scientists are already alarmed that the numerous fires happening in this area of the country could put the whole ecosystem balance of the Amazon region in danger.

In the “death belt”, as the agricultural frontier is called in the region, the advancement of farming is linked to low productivity and little overview. Nature is “cheap asset” to the immigrant population of land-owners, usually from traditional European farming families from the South of Brazil. Their cultural values are not linked to the reality of the forest and local knowledge is eagerly substituted by that of the modernized world.

The total population in the 2010 census was 30.810 people. Half of the population was first generation immigrant and those from the region did not claim to be “indigenous” or from traditional communities. Although farming in this area is one of the most rentable industries in the country, less than 10% of the population earned more than five minimum salaries per month, or the equivalent of $950 per month, while half of the population was below the poverty line.

Images by Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

TI capoto/jarina

Peixoto de Azevedo

kamayura and kalapalo communities in the indigenous territory of xingu , mt

The Xingu Indigenous Territory (TIX) was structured in the 60’s to safeguard the rich cultural and ecological environment of the South Xingu River Basin against the colonization and occupation of the area promoted by Federal and Estate policies. It houses sixteen different indigenous ethnicities with a complex and rich cultural heritage that includes seven different linguistic families and specific social traits, connected by intermarriage and social bonds. Its 2.642.003 hectares of forests and savannas form a rich ecological system that helps safeguard the lush rain forest further North.

Surrounded by the “death hug”, as the agricultural frontier is known in the State of Mato Grosso, it is currently threatened by an unprecedented number of wild fires. Deforestation caused by soy and cattle have decreased the air humidity to very low levels, taking away the region’s natural protection against fires (natural or man-made).

Several river sources are also outside the reserve and have been systematically threatened by deforestation, farming chemicals and manure.

The pressure on the Indigenous Territory is immense and its people are in constant check. One other consequence of the intense colonization of the area is the dependence growth on external sources of food. Several communities are abandoning their traditional farming methods and gardens (roças) and relying on western food coming from outside the reserve. This has brought much food insecurity, as it has increased rates of diseases, such as diabetes and high blood pressure.

Sedentary habits have led families to abandon the traditional agro-forestation farming system and the forest is not being regenerated as before.

As forest resources become further and scarcer, the whole cultural system is affected.

Images: . Kamayura (Ipawu) and Kalapalo villages.

Surroundings with delapidated forests with approximate areas of 1.5 million square meters and 6 million square meters. . Location map . Site plan drawing of Ipawu Images by Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan (top three) and from the "Kamayura Architecture Manual"(A. Dietzsch and L.O. Farias)

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AFUÁ, PA

In Afuá, a town of 30.000 people, on the shores of the Amazon estuary, there are no cars for a simple reason: the entire city is built on stilts, palafitas, making possible the coexistence between this Amazon estuary city and the river’s tide cycles.

Buildings, homes, streets and infrastructure are raised above ground level, and the city exists as a long, elevated pathway on which bicycles, people and animals circulate and dwell.

Parque Estadual Charapucu

Given its location at the delta where the river meets the Atlantic Ocean, Afua is prone to daily "floods".

The water levels change more drastically during “winter” (December through May), when it can reach the buildings suspended by the infrastructure of stilts. During “summer” water levels vary daily, but in subtler ways. “Sometimes the sports court is flooded and kids have fun with their little canoes.

They know the water will be gone in 5 or 6 hours”, says Manoela Vaz, who lives in Afua.

Contradicting common denominators of urban planning, the water risings in Afuá seem to be integrated to city life. Never referred to as “floods”, the rivers’ high waters are an intrinsic component of the city’s activities.

Often referred to as the “suspended city”, the “Amazonian Venice” or the “Tropical Amsterdam”, Afuá is a paradigmatic case of a city built with the river, and not against it. The adaptation of the urban environment to the river cycles is visible on the material, architectural and organization strategies, as well as in the social and political ecosystems of the city. Different urban and architectural rules, dictated by a principle of cohabitation with the river, govern the urban layout and the social cycles, who themselves revolve around the daily tides and the seasonal rains. (http://portal.iphan.gov.br/uploads/ckfinder/arquivos)

Image by Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan (above and top right), from web (at right), with non identified sources and images of Afua (to the right).

Afua’s footprint and the cyclical flood planes Scale: 1: 250 000

SAO GABRIEL DA CACHOEIRA, AM

Sao Gabriel da Cachoeira is the second largest Brazilian district, with 109,000 km2, at the border of Colombia and Venezuela, in one of the most pristine patches of forest in the country. It is structured around the Black River Basin, where twenty-four different ethnicities are organized in more than seven hundred small settlements around the net of rivers, with a complex web of cultural and economic interchange that originated at least six thousand years ago. The millenary agricultural practices of agro-florestation are still the base of the economic and food security structures and have been considered a national cultural landmark by UNESCO.

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The district has a population of approximately 42.000 people, 98% of which consider themselves Indigenous. The city of Sao Gabriel accounts for half of the population in the district and presents serious socialeconomic problems, with little sanitation, food insecurity and high rates of suicide.

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YAMADO COMMUNITY, AM

Yamado is one of the almost seven hundred communities around the Black River Basin, in the District of Sao Gabriel da Cachoeira. Close to the city of Sao Gabriel, it has approximately 125 people.

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Around the basin, small villages have sustained their traditional way of life, still farming and fishing for subsistence and following practices that encourage community life. Houses are usually organized around an empty plaza, as in the traditional Indigenous villages of the past, and several communities eat their daily meals together.

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On one hand, there is no abundance, but on the other, no one goes hungry either. The villages are organized around the traditional political practice, having a “chief”, who is nowadays voted for every two or four years, and who works as a mediator and provider.

Images by Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan Pictures by Anna Dietzsch and Clarissa Morgenroth

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22 casas 110 pessoas Área: 7.800m²

Centro de São Gabriel da Cachoeira

22 casas 110 pessoas Espaço negativo: 4.240m²

13 casas 1130 pessoas Área: 7.700m²

Comunidade Yamado

13 casas 1130 pessoas Espaço negativo: 6.280m²

7. CONTACTS, STAKEHOLDERS AND ACADEMIC PROJECT SCENARIOS

My approach to this research begins with the understanding that as designers and planners, we need to go beyond the antagonistic framework of “urban versus natural environments”, to firmly position ourselves in the discourse concerning the Amazon.

Architects still have a timid voice in this debate, having left the discussion and ideas about the Amazon’s future to other fields and disciplines, while we have much to contribute. With the multidisciplinary environment of the university, as well as with all the different expertise and talents from the School of Architecture + Planning, students could be engaged in an important debate.

The complexity and scale of the theme around the urbanization of the Amazon and other "transitional" peri-urban areas in Brazil, could be unfolded into many different lines of research and design exploration. Different planning strategies and direct design initiatives could give rise to interesting seminars and studio proposals, but could also be connected to local communities and “real” issues, creating practical benefits beyond the academia. My experience working in Brazil and in the Amazonian region has led me to make several local partners, who could become agents in the proposals for academic exploration.

Below is a summary of some of the initiatives and communities with which I am involved and some ideas of how they could be brought into context of our academic debate.

Pictures: Images of São Gabriel da Cachoeira (Amazon) and communities around it.

By Anna Dietzsch

8. PAST AND FUTURE RESEARCH: ATTEMPTS IN RETHINKING URBAN DEVELOPMENT MODELS FOR a forest CITY Sao Gabriel da Cachoeira Amazonas

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“Indígenas Aprovam Plano de Gestão no NO Amazônico”,

https://www.socioambiental.org/en/node/6225

Image: The diagram below shows the current seed trade between different ethnicities in the river basin. The sophisticated farming techniques of this region were considered a "cultural landmark" by UNESCO

As part of my research onto the rising participation of indigenous populations into Brazilian politics, I first went to Sao Gabriel da Cachoeira in 2017 and was able to gather an extensive collection of material and information, including thirty interviews with city council members, the mayor, residents of the city, anthropologists, archeologists, geographers and residents of different communities along the Black River Basin, which is the largest black water basin in the world. It also enabled a partnership with different local indigenous community organizations, including FOIRN (Federation of the Indigenous Organizations of the Black River), which is the umbrella organization for the region and ISA (Socio-Environment Institute), a national and important organization with close contact and involvement with hundreds of indigenous ethnicities around Brazil, with whom I later collaborated in revising the regions’s “Environmental and Territorial Management Plan for the Indigenous Territories of the High an Medium Black River”15 .

Sao Gabriel da Cachoeira is the second largest Brazilian district, with 109,000 km2, at the border of Colombia and Venezuela, in one of the most pristine patches of forest in the country. It is structured around the Black River Basin, where twenty-four different ethnicities are organized in more than seven hundred small settlements around the net of rivers and a complex web of cultural and economic interchange that originated at least six thousand years ago. The millenary agricultural practices of agroflorestation are still the base of the economic and food security structures and have been considered a national cultural landmark by UNESCO. But with four centuries of colonization and successive cycles of cultural rupture, the original spatial and social dynamics of the area have been transformed and are increasingly polarized by migration to the city of Sao Gabriel, which almost tripled its population in the last two decades. The city currently has a population of 28.000 people, 98% of which consider themselves Indigenous.

By ISA, Manejo do Mundo, 2010

Pictures: Images of São Gabriel da Cachoeira

Albeit its rich natural and cultural context, it carries all the maladies of a small poor Brazilian city such as lack of infrastructure, environmental and health problems and lack of appropriate housing. It is a good example of how once sustainable settlements in the Amazon are now transforming themselves into urban centers with no account to their surroundings nor their culture, and a collection of “modern maladies”, such as high rates of suicide and prostitution.

It is also a good example into the urban phenomena in the Amazonian region, defying the simplistic notion of a duality between “modern people” and “indigenous people” in favor of a much more complex gradient of territorial and social practices, pointing to forms of a “hybrid urbanization” and potential hypotheses for a third landscape.

One practical proposal for design interventions/exploration is the revision of the city’s Official Master Plan. The plan is from 2012 and operates within the logic of “traditional urban zoning and development”, with no connection to the reality of the context. With mayoral elections approaching, several indigenous organizations are now discussing how they could revise the plan and also its theoretical framework to inform different models of urbanization and development, as well as policies that reflect the environmental, cultural and legal specificities of the area. From recent talks with community leaders from the region, I believe there is an open opportunity now to question “Western models”, as the indigenous population has started to review their priorities and deny the homogenized and generic treatment from the federal government, looking for local solutions that are closer to their environment and cultural values.

Image: Albeit being in one of the most preserved ecosystems in the world, the urban growth of São Gabriel disregards the natural strata, when it could tap into it to grow

Below are sketches and diagrams to exemplify how this discussion could be expanded.

By Anna Dietzsch and Pedro Pereira

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ideas for a forest city

In the city of Sao Gabriel the Indigenous population is suffering from all the “normal” maladies brought in with “progress” and poverty, including food insecurity. Around the basin, small villages have sustained a more traditional way of life, still farming and fishing for subsistence and following practices that encourage community life. In the villages, houses are usually organized around an empty plaza, as in the traditional Indigenous villages of the past, and several communities eat their daily meals together.

On one hand, there is no abundance, but on the other, no one goes hungry either. The villages are organized around the traditional political practice, having a “chief”, who is nowadays voted for every two or four years, and who in reality works as a mediator and provider.

When asked about the differences between “city” and “village”, most of the people I interviewed mentioned “money” as the main divider: “In the city you need money to do everything”. The other most discussed issues were farming (“you don’t have room in the city”) and isolation (“in the city everyone is in their little box”). Still, it is the place where “there are schools” and “one can go to parties”, or “needs to go to access the bank”.

But if Sao Gabriel’s population is 98% indigenous, couldn’t we think of a different city? A Forest City, an Indigenous City, a city that can benefit from both worlds? It could start by re-accessing the grid. If we need a grid for transportation (do we?), the blocks could be organized around the empty common space, as in the Indigenous village. Housing could be inspired by the “maloca” (traditional house in the region), to shelter extended families, or multiple families, with common social spaces.

Water channels and the natural filters of the “igarapés” (streams with typical regional vegetation) could be reproduced to source the block and help with sewage treatment.

As Sao Gabriel today is already “mapped” by the location of different ethnicities, these blocks could help the cohesion of the different communities, who should, on turn, be represented by their leaders in community councils that are more ingrained and linked to the daily life of the city. The elected mayor would mediate with the “world outside” and deal with the formal national politics.

Images by Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

ideas for a forest city (continued) 30m

In this area food security is historically linked to small-scale farming and the calendar is organized around rotational planting.

Traditional farming is a big deal, as it is also an efficient agro-florestation method. The proposal is to look into spatial arrangements that can accommodate farming in densified areas, using the principles of temporality and mutability for designing the buildings and admitting the land as common good.

As in the traditional “roça”, groups of families could share rotational lots to farm in the city, so the principles of the traditional agro-florestation could be used to always maintain a percentage of the lots free of farming and in the process of reforestation.

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The traditional house is built with biodegradable materials and has a life-span of approximately 15 years. The proposition is to look into hybrid technologies that could create movable structures that are biodegradable, or last long periods and can be reused in different lots.

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65ha área de floresta derrubada a cada 3 anos por uma comunidade de aproximadamente 25 famílias *fonte ISA

According to research and workshops led by ISA (Environmental and Social Institute), one family needs approximately 2.6 ha of land for farming every three years, so a community with 25 people will need 65 ha every three years.

By measuring some of the villages around Sao Gabriel and interviewing the people there, I concluded that a three km radius is a good distance for the “village’s influence”, or the area where its dwellers can walk to plant. Based on these two premises, I mapped the possibility of having the rotational farming in a 30 year period in this area for a population of approximately 125 people. This is a long enough period for the forest to fully regenerate.

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These villages and their areas of influence could be arranged along the water bodies inland in a 40km radius from the city, so that it could be easily accessed by water using the most popular means of daily transportation; a canoe with a 25hp or 40hp motor. These canoes are small and light and could be powered by solar panels in the future. This way, a different pattern of density starts to arise, and a different relationship between nature and urban begin to be defined.

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Image below: Diagram of the Yamado Community, sited acccross the river from the city of Sao Gabriel Images by Anna Dietzsch and Mariana Gortan

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CYCLES OF RUPTURE AND CULTURAL RESILIENCY IN SAO GABRIEL DA CACHOEIRA, AM

According to anthropologist Michel Heckenberg, the Amazon forest could have been home to approximately 30 million Indians before the arrival of Portuguese colonizers. Hundreds of ethnicities lived in the Rio Negro basin interconnected by a network of relationships and exchanges. A series of events, from the colonization to the institution of the republic, and the commodification of the Amazon, caused waves of migrations up and down the Rio Negro Basin. Many ethnicities were drastically reduced or extinguished through series of epidemics and acts of violence.

The insertion of institutions of cohesion and assimilation (churchs, schools, etc.) also played a role in changing the nature of the settlements, rearranging them from centered to axial (i.e. having the church as its main axis).

It deeply ruptured the cultural identity of native indians, modifying their structures of power, religion and symbolism.

Currently, despite the fast growth of urban centers in the Amazon, the application of general regulations without understanding contextual surroundings turn these centers into slums with significant social problems, while surrounded by incredible wealth of natural resources.

Images by Anna Dietzsch and Lorena Galvao

9. PAST AND FUTURE RESEARCH: ATTEMPTS IN RETHINKING URBAN DEVELOPMENT MODELS FOR a forest CITY Ipawu Mato Grosso

In partnership with the Kamayurá community I had the opportunity to lead a seminar and traveling workshop at Escola da Cidade, a progressive architecture school in Sao Paulo. In the first semester of 2019, invited by the Kamayurá community, we took fifteen students to the Xingu Indigenous Territory (TIX) in order to jointly make the “Kamayurá Architecture Manual”. This effort is inserted within the context of a broader plan that the Kamayurá are putting in place, so as to establish a Kamayurá cultural archive within their own territory.

Picture (above): Drawing of the territory By the Kamayurá

Picture (right): Working session for development of the “Manual of Kamayura Architecture”: Escola da Cidade and the Kamayura people of Ipawu

By Takuma Kamayurá

The Kamayurá people have been in Xingu since the end of the XVIII Century and play an important role in the area. They are organized in three villages, all located at the formation of the Xingu River Basin, where the Koluene and Xingu rivers meet, which is also known as the “birth-place of the world” by people in Xingu. Their largest village, Ipawú, currently houses 450 people.

Pictures: Ipawu village

By Anna Dietzsch

Since the 70’s extensive monocultures of grains and low-yield cattle ranching have grown at a vertiginous pace around the park and now encroach it in what Brazilians refer to as the “death hug”, endangering its ecosystems and population - “The park remains as an island of forest increasingly threatened by activity outside its perimeter.”

With the rise of anti-indigenous and anti-environmentalist policies brought in by Brazil's new government, the external incentives are becoming scarcer and the indigenous population is again left to defend itself on its own. Issues of food-security and social justice have risen as priorities.

Picture: deforestation around Xingu Territory

By Anna Dietzsch

Image: Ipawu has cleared almost 50 times more area for its farming today, than their traditional farming techniques needed

By Anna Dietzsch

Images (above): Drawings of the "Oka Ete", the "True House" Images from the "Kamayura Architecture Manual"

Picture (right): Kamayurá building masters drawing the "Oka Ete"

By Anna Dietzsch

This new political cycle has placed the Kamayurá in a delicate place. Sedentary habits and subsidized access to gasoline and food led to the abandonment of traditional farming and created a vicious cycle of dependence on imported food. With the scarcity of yield diversity, vitamin and mineral food sources were lost and new food habits created health problems, such as the increase of diabetes. Without rotational farming, agro-forestation and crop diversity, synergy with the forest was lost, resulting in a great area of dilapidated soil around the village (approximately 1.5 million m2). On another scale, issues with man-made fires and illegal exploitation of the park’s flora and fauna, caused by the surrounding fields of extensive soy monoculture, raises the issue of better border security.

During our recent visit to Xingu, the Kamayurá have asked us to continue the joint work started around the “Kamayurá Architecture Manual” and make a “Kamayurá Farming Manual”, to help them bring back their traditional planting practices and safeguarded and restore the forest around their villages. A planning strategy for the park’s South border, with assessment of existing context and conditions and a design vision for its protection is also needed.

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Images from: Dietzsch, A. and Farias, Luis Octavio, from the "Kamayura Architectre Manual" Picture by Anna Dietzsch

10. PAST AND FUTURE RESEARCH: ATTEMPTS IN RETHINKING URBAN DEVELOPMENT MODELS FOR A FOREST CITY Tenondé-Porã

Since 2013, I have been involved with the Guarani-Mbya communities around the City of São Paulo, helping them in their path to legalize their territory. In addition to the leadership of Kalipety and Tenondé, two villages situated in the most Southern neighborhood of the city, I also have a partnership with Escola da Cidade, and CTI (Center for Indigenous Research), a local organization with a long history with the Guarani communities of the country’s South.

The Guarani-Mbya have occupied the Southern coastal areas of Brazil for thousands of years. Having resisted the violence of subjugation and Christianization, they are still present in the region, including heavily urbanized areas like São Paulo. As part of a bigger movement to guarantee the legalization of their Indigenous Territory in the outskirts of the metropolis, a group of young Guarani founded Kalipety, a new village where twentyfive families occupy a former brickyard. The village of is situated in a transitional area, a "border territory", where urban and rural zones intertwine with the Atlantic Rain Forest and the protected areas of the rain forest coastal park.

Pictures (above): Colonia and Barragem Neighborhoods, located in the vicinities of the Guarani village Kalipety 1

Aerial picture (right) showing Southern Sao Paulo and the Rain Forest reaching down to the coast. Marqued areas are: 1. Area +/- equivalent to the 15.7000 hectares of the Guarani-Mbya territory 2. Rain Forest Park zone where there is an approx. 400 meter topographical drop

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Conscious of the importance their original culture and background have in the survival of their community, this Guarani group is rapidly reviving and strengthening their cultural identity. Led by Jera Poty Mirī, a local young Guarani woman, Kalipety is being transformed into a laboratory for agro-forestation and traditional Guarani agriculture.

Having collected traditional seeds from other villages in the South of Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay, they have established a Guarani seed bank and currently have crops that include more than thirty types of Guarani sweet potatoes and eight types of Guarani corn. Agricultural and forest management support comes from an agro-florestation group based in Bahia, as well as from permaculture groups from Sao Paulo. They have developed a program to aid forestation, using the eucalyptus once planted there for timber as one of the main elements for soil regeneration, as they adapt to planting permanent cultures and the need to continuously renew soil fertility.

Future plans include the construction of educational support houses and the implantation of a community and labor-based educational system, like the experience of the “Maison Familiale Rurales”, in France , as well as the occupation of the new 15.700 hectares Indigenous Territory which they were granted at the end of 2016, even though the entire legal process has not been finalized.

Pictures (right and above): Jera Poty and a sweet-potato crop area. To date, the GuaraniMbya in Kalipety have been able to plant and harvest several different kinds of Guarani sweet corn and Guarani sweet potatoes like the jety-andai (yellow inside and red outside), jety-ava (white inside and red outside) and the jety-karaū (purple)

By Paula Lyn

Picture: In Kalipety, every family is free to make variations in their planting, and walking along the paths that cross the village, in the rain forest, one sees small patches of crops, including corn, pineapple, manioc, sweetpotato, taioba, banana, different kinds of peppers, berries, oranges and papaya

By Paula Lyn

Pictures: Guarani corn and collected Guarani seeds

By Raiz das Imagens

Pictures: Kalipety village

By Paula Lyn

The juxtaposition of the Guarani culture and practices within the context of a twentymillion people metropolis provides fertile ground for design and planning exploration around the theme of “border territories” and in this case, one that is being redefined, and already occupied, as an Indigenous Territory. An architecture studio in this area would be able to investigate the challenges involved in the confrontation between natural systems and the city’s urbanization logic, but it would also deal with the encounter of two different "imaginaries": the reality of the newly formed GauranyMbya territory and that of the local non-indigenous population who have historically settled there.

Design speculation could begin with the Indigenous social organization and then reimagin a new spatial structure for the area, where new economic and social strategies and policies could support a new spatial arrangements, including such basic concepts as property ownership. This would involve decisions on the macro scale about density and urban growth, at the same time as the discussion on ways to inhabit areas that are still “natural”. Juxtapositions would be axial in bringing questions and answers to the area: preserved forest vs urban sprawling, modern city vs Indian city, farming vs city building, farming vs forest, centralized and hierarchical government vs community and decentralized decision making.

11. PAST AND FUTURE RESEARCH: ATTEMPTS IN RETHINKING URBAN DEVELOPMENT MODELS FOR A FOREST CITY After-thoughts on the Urbanization of the Brazilian Amazon

Pictures (above): Kamayura village of Ipawu, in Xingu and Parque das Tribos, in Manaus Picts. by Anna Dietzsch

Context and issues: 1.

The polarization of “city-states” (Belem and Manaus x the extensive web of small/medium cities and towns) and the existing voting system brings great political unbalance, with high concentration of power and resources + great environmental unbalances. Heavy reliance on goods coming from large cities and fossil-fuel dependent transportation, lack of ideological connections between “city” and “rural”, etc. all contribute to the invisibility of the large system of small towns and villages that populate the Brazilian Amazon; 2.

The web of small/medium-small cities connected to the extraction industries (including extensive farming) and in large part connected to the highway systems forms the platform for the extractive engine to function and is key to the preservation (or devastation) of the environment/forest. It is not enough to think about the “big city”, or the “urban-as-we-know-it”. We need to remediate and transform existing large centers, but also repurpose the web of small centers, to stop the environmental loss and build an effective platform for environmentally-healthy economic production; 3.

The web of settlement nodes is geographically extensive (spread out) and connects to even more extensive rural areas – there is a serious need to rethink how communication and interdependencies could happen. Transportation channels need to be redirected to the abundant water system and there should be macro and micro planning to see how areas with non-navigable water bodies could be reached (what would a “water urbanism” look like in the Brazilian Amazon?); 4.

Urban development seriously engaged with environmental prosperity needs to be sustained by high-efficiency agrarian production: either by adapting local agro-florestation practices, or with the use of adaptable foreign” technologies, like high-yield cattle ranching and/or rotational small scale-grazing techniques; 5.

Small and medium centers need to form independent clusters attached to local production and high self-sufficiency – the flows of regional, national and global commodities needs to be short-circuited; 6.

In acting/designing for both big and small urban centers, spatial policies should be directly linked to socio-economic policies that address historic patterns of colonization and servitude - as example, see Brondizio’s analysis of Belém: socio-economic conditions in the colonial/agrarian world are so bad, people still prefer to live in miserable conditions in urban centers without questioning them; 7.

The magnitude of Amazon eco-system(s) (still) present opportunities that will help revert the scenario of destruction. There are deep-rooted cultures and local socio-economic practices that can be used and should base urban interventions and policies (both in big and small cities), so these can be environmentally sustainable, but also resilient in the long term.

Draft for alternative practices: 1.

Introduce sustainable (soft, nature-based) infrastructure systems that are multi-functional, multi-scalar and coherent to local practices. One simple example: when planning sewage easements in low-income, low-density neighborhoods, provide communal backyards as spaces for planting to guarantee food security, soil permeability and pollution filtration, as well as social strengthening of “feminine space” and opportunity for social cohesion; 2.

Create policies and incentives for the communal property of land, so settlement patterns can be separated from land-subdivision and follow the natural stratum (watersheds, ecosystems, etc.), as well as pre-existing cultural/political arrangements.

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Acknowledge indigenous cultural heritage and importance as a national and regional asset and create infrastructure for pendular rural-urban migration (avoid one way migration) for the exchange of technologies and knowledges (ex. Parque das Tribos in Manaus); 4.

Small towns have little State and Federal money repass, so rely on grants and targeted money obtained through submission of project requests regulated by bureaucratic premises. Instrumentalizing cities/towns to apply for these grants is an

Picture from plane over the municipal area of Sao Gabriel da Cachoeira, AM. Pict. by Anna Dietzsch

important venue for money income; 5.

Municipal boundaries are manipulated to accommodate extensive agro-business practices or extractive industries and should be revised. Definition of what is “rural” and what is “urban” should also be revised, specially in face of existing private and public financing that follow these categories and are distorted for the Amazonian reality; 6.

Introduce incentives and policies that help the retention of youth in small urban centers and strengthen social resiliency; 7.

Review possibility of having direct representation of Indigenous territories in the administrative management engine of Federal and State governments. See proposals for instituting “National Territories” (like Acre once was) launched during Lula’s government;

Selected Bibliography . Books and Articles . Albert, Bruce and Kopenawa, Davi . The Falling Sky, 2013 . Almeida, Maria Regina . Os Indios na Historia do Brasil, Sao Paulo, 2016 . Alves, L. . Indigenous Leader Seeks One Million Euros to Build Fence Around Xingu, 2019, Available from: https://riotimesonline.com/brazil-news/rio-politics/society/ indigenous-leader-seeks-one-million-euros-to-build-fence-around-xingu/ . Anderson, Benedict . Imagined Communities, 2006 . Baniwa e Coripaco . O que a Gente Precisa para Viver Bem no Mundo, ISA, Manaus, 2001 . Brondizio, Eduardo . “Inter Urban Dependency among Amazonian Cities”, in Redes, 2009 . Buckminster Fuller, Richard . Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth, Lars Muller Publishers, 2008 . Cabalzar, Aloisio . Manejo do Mundo, ISA, Sao Paulo, 2010 . Cabalzar, Aloisio . Ciclos Anuais no Rio Tiquie, ISA, Sao Paulo, 2016 . Carneiro, Manuela C . Cultura com Aspas, Ubu Editora, Sao Paulo, 2018 . Castells, Manuel . The Informational City, 1992 . Castoriadis, Cornelius . The Imaginary Institution of Society . Clasters, Pierre . A Sociedade Contra o Estado, Rio de Janeiro, 1978 . Da Cunha, Dilip . The Invention of Rivers, University of Pennsylvania, 2019 . Dietzsch, A, Faria e Silva, L, Forjaz, C, Morgentroth, C, 2019 . Manual da Arquitetura Kamayurá, Vol.02, 2019 Available from: https://issuu.com/annajubs/docs/190812_ kamayura_casatradicional . Dietzsch, A, Faria e Silva, L, Forjaz, C, Morgentroth, C,. Manual da Arquitetura Kamayurá, Vol.01, 2019 . Available from: https://issuu.com/annajubs/docs/190812_ casakamayurasingles . Dietzsch, A . Indigeneity and Urbanization in the Amazon, 2018 . Available from: https://issuu.com/annajubs/docs/1903_indigeneityurbanism_creditos . Dietzsch, Anna . A Visit to the Guarani in Sao Paulo (https://www.thenatureofcities. com/2017/06/04/visit-guarani-mbya-sao-paulo/) . Guattari, Felix . The Three Ecologies, 2014 . Graeber, David . Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology . Heckenberger, Michael . The Ecology of Power + “Amazonia 1492: Pristine Forest or Cultural Parkland?” . Harvey, David . Spaces of Hope, 2000 + “Megacities Lecture 4”, year 2000 + “The Right to the City” in City Transformations, Urban Age, 2013 . Hodgkings, Martha . Letters to a Young Farmer, 2017 . Howard, Ebenezer . Garden Cities of Tomorrow, 2009 . Krenak, Ailton . Ideias para Adiar o Fim do Mundo, Sao Paulo, 2019 . Lefebvre, Henry . The Urban Revolution, 2003 + Critique of Everyday Life, 2014 . Levi Strauss, Claude. Myth and Meaning, 1995 + Anthropology Confronts the Problems of the Modern World, 2013 . Mollison, B. . Permaculture a Designers Manual, Tagari Publications, Tasmania, 1988 .Monte-Mor, Roberto Luis . "Extended Urbanization in the Brazilian Amazonia" + “What is Urban Now” in Cadernos de Saude Publica + “Urban Hierarchy in the Brazilian Amazon” + “Extended Urbanization and Settlement Patterns: an Environmental Approach” in ResearchGate (https://www.researchgate.net/) . Mostafavi, Mohsen . Ecological Urbanism, 2012 . Neves, Eduardo . Arqueologia da Amazonia, Rio de Janeiro, 2006 + "Ancient Amazonian populations left lasting impacts on forest structurte", in ESA Journals, 2017 + Ancient Amazonian populations left lasting impacts on forest structure, in Ecosphere Volume 08(12).

. Orff, Kate . Toward an Urban Ecology, 2016 . O’Shaughnessy, Martin . “Thinking about the Common with Pierre Dardot and Christian Laval” + “Nine Key Propositions to Building the Common” (https://lafranceetlacrise. org/2015/12/02/thinking-about-the-common-with-thinking-about-the-common-withpierre-dardot-and-christian-laval/) . Ribeiro, D. Uma jornada em busca de reconstruir a sabedoria dos Kamayurá, Rio de Janeiro, 2019, Available from: https://www.itaucultural.org.br/secoes/rumos/uma-jornada-em-busca-de-reconstruira-sabedoria-dos-kamayura . Sá, Dannyel, Sementes Nativas que Conectam o Xingu, ISA, Sao Paulo, 2017 . Sennet, Richard . Efficient or Sociable Cities? ” in City Transformations, Urban Age, 2013 . Simmel, George . The Metropolis and Mental Life, 1950 . Sorkin, Michael . Variations on a Theme Park, 1992 . Taylor, Charles . Modern Social Imaginaries, 2004 . Villas-Boas, A. De Olho na Bacia do Xingu, ISA, Sao Paulo, 2012 . Velasquez-Manoff, Moises . “Can Dirt Save the Earth?” in The NY Times Magazine, April 2018 . Virnig, A. Equator Initiatives Case Studies, Instituto Raoni, 2018, Available from: https://www.equatorinitiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Instituto-RaoniBrazil.pdf . Viveiros de Castro, Eduardo . Araweté, 2017 + The Relative Native, 2015 + “Prefacio: O Indio em Devir” in Baré, Povo do Rio, 2015 Websites: . Socio-Environmental Institute . https://www.socioambiental.org/en . Census Brazil . https://www.ibge.gov.br . National Indian Foundation . www.funai.gov.br . Federation of the Indigenous Organizations of Rio Negro . www.foirn.org.br . Guarani Comission Yvyrupa . http://www.yvyrupa.org.br . Guarani Digital Maps . http://guarani.map.as/#!/ . SOS Mata Atlantica . http://www.sosma.org.br/en/ . Bioma Maps . http://mapbiomas.org . Chico Mendes Institute . http://mapas.icmbio.gov.br . Brazilian National Electric Energy Agency . http://www.aneel.gov.br . Brazilian National Mining Association . www.dnpm.gov.br . Brazilian National Transportation Department . www.dnit.gov.br . United Nations Sustainable Development Goals Platform . https://sdgs.un.org/ . Agenda Gotsch . www.agendagotsch.com . Savory Institute . www.savory.global . John Todd Ecological design . www.toddecological.com . Amazon Environmental Institute. www.ipam.org.br . Nucleus for Indigenous Environmental and Cultural Territory Management. https:// www.ngtecindigena.fund/ . Brazilian National Institute for Spatial Research . http://www.inpe.br/ . NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies . https://www.giss.nasa.gov/ . NASA Earth Observatory . https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/ . Instituto Terra . http://institutoterra.org/ . Escola da Cidade . http://www.escoladacidade.org/ . Center for Resilient Cities and Landscape - https://crcl.columbia.edu/ . Earth Institute . https://www.earth.columbia.edu/ . Institute of Latin Amrican Studies . https://ilas.columbia.edu/ . Libraries at University of Sao Paulo . https://www.aguia.usp.br/

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Third Landscape URBANIZATION IN THE AMAZON Anna Dietzsch © All copy-rights reserved to the author, except when otherwise noted.