The suburb that Rio de Janeiro invented

imaginative mobilities around an allegory of the city

Abstract

In the city of Rio de Janeiro, suburb as a category carries a particular meaning, accumulating aesthetic, moral and affective connotations. The objective of this text is to analyze the imaginative mobilities that involve the suburbs of Rio. Inspired by the analytical framework of the mobile turn of social theory, we take as our empirical corpus audiovisual works that have created and continue to circulate polysemic meanings around the category. A falecida (1965), A Grande Família (1972-1975 and 2001-2014) and Suburbia (2012) reflect possibilities that orbit the imaginative repertoire about the suburbs and their inhabitants, amplifying their allegorical dimension and revealing the nuances explored in their meanings. Far from reflecting a systematic analysis of this production, we seek to underline the relevance of the theme and raise questions for a research agenda sensitive to the imaginative mobilities that define the menu of representations about Brazilian, Latin American and Global South cities.