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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SANTA CRUZ THE PRODUCTION OF PLACE, URBAN DEVELOPMENT, AND PUBLIC SPACES IN AN EMERGING TOURIST ECONOMY IN NORTHEASTERN BRAZIL A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in ANTHROPOLOGY with an emphasis in LATIN AMERICAN AND LATINO STUDIES by Christian T. Palmer December 2014 The Dissertation of Christian T. Palmer is approved: _____________________________________ Mark Anderson, Chair _____________________________________ Andrew Mathews _____________________________________ Megan Moodie ___________________________ Tyrus Miller Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies Copyright © by Christian T. Palmer 2014 TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures v Abstract vi Acknowledgments viii Chapters 1. Introduction 1 Theorizing tourism, identity, and place 6 Local histories and relationships to place 16 Brazilian regionalism and Northeastern Brazil 18 Brazilian Nationalism and Landscape 22 Cosmopolitan tropicalism, the Brazilian Hawaii 24 Ethnographic process 28 Overview of chapters 31 Interlude: Fishing in Itacaré 36 2. Surfers “discover” Itacaré: performance, place, and 46 identity in the tropics Counter culture, the global sixties, and the development of 50 surfing in Brazil Surfers arrive in Itacaré 56 Surfers' habitus and the embodied performance of place 61 Surfers transform the city 69 Environmentalism and surfing 76 The Brazilian Hawaii 81 3. State sponsored tourism and conservation 93 The paving of BR001 and PRODETUR 97 Terra devolutas as public land and agrarian reform in Itacaré 110 Recreating a region: protected area as public space 120 Alternative futures: extractive reserves, petro-development 133 and the Porto Sul 4. Neighborhood Growth and Urban Expansion 138 Tourism and land tenure 141 Pituba and Concha: tourism development and the politics 150 of land division Concha: the only “planned” subdivisions 164 Santo Antonio, Passagem, and Angelim: popular neighborhoods 167 and the politics of land distribution Santo Antonio 168 Passagem 180 Neighborhood geographies of drugs and violence 184 iii Angelim 187 Porto de Trás: an Urban Quilombo 191 Qunadaries about legal titling and future neighborhoods 196 5. Tourism, changing architectural styles and the 203 production of place Homes, identities, and the production of place 209 Colonial Architecture 213 Sobrados from the cacao era 217 Northeastern art-deco 227 Rustic Chic 231 Regional Modern 242 A comparison of Rustic Chic and Regional modern homes 250 6. Public space and public power: parks, beaches, and parties 259 Parks, parties, and public works 263 Praça São Miguel 265 Praça da Mangueira 275 The cultural development of beaches in Brazil 278 Occupation, use, and ownership of beaches in Itacaré 285 Pontal and Coroinha: the local's beaches 290 Tourism development on Itacaré's urban beaches and Conchas 296 do Mar Ranch Resende and SVEA: the possibility of better big business 304 Daily practices of use and occupation 310 Local conflicts over sewage and space 319 Beaches and the aesthetics of liminality and the SPU 326 Itacare’s Southern Coast and Luxury Resort Development 333 Large landowners and conflicts over beach access 340 Vendor and landowners on Southern beaches 347 Conclusion 349 Bibliography 351 iv LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Figure 1: Promotional Poster for Surf Eco Festival 2013 Figure 2: Jorge Amado's Hawaiian Shirts on Display at the Casa Cultural Jorge Amado, Ilhéus, Bahia, Brazil Figure 3: Ecological and Economic Zoning for the Itacaré/Serra Grande Environmental Protected Area expanded to include the entire municipality. Figure 4: Neighborhoods of Itacaré (Satellite Imagery from Google maps) Figure 5: Houses and Pousadas in Concha Figure 6: Bairro Novo and self-built homes Figure 7: Jesuit Church of São Miguel, built in 1723 Figure 8: Restored Townhouses from the Cacao Era 1890-1930 Figure 9: Northeastern Art Deco Homes and Secondary School, 1930-1980 Figure 10: Rustic Chic Homes and Businesses Figure 11: Regional Modern Architecture Figure 12: Historic photo of Praça São Miguel circa 1940 Figure 13: Craft Vendor Tents at the Praça da Mangueira Figure 14: Urban Beaches of Itacaré (Satellite imagery from Google maps) Figure 15: Occupation of Ribera Beach by Restaurants Figure 16: Eduardo's Shack with rustic expansion Figure 17: Southern Beaches of Itacaré (Satellite imagery from Google maps) Figure 18: Warapuru Ruins near Engenhoca Beach v ABSTRACT Christian Palmer THE PRODUCTION OF PLACE, URBAN DEVELOPMENT, AND PUBLIC SPACES IN AN EMERGING TOURIST ECONOMY IN NORTHEASTERN BRAZIL This dissertation asks how the town of Itacaré has developed as it has transitioned from an extractive to a tourist economy and reveals the tensions between different groups along regional, racial, and class lines. I argue that the production of place in a tourist economy creates a new emphasis on public spaces as landscapes. These landscapes, both urban and rural, then become key sites of economic value and collective identity. To examine these public spaces and changing landscapes this dissertation looks at the relationship between the legal systems of land tenure and informal systems of use and occupation, and the ongoing negotiations between local politicians, large landowners, and residents in claiming rights to these spaces. Important public spaces include conservation areas, agrarian reform settlements, parks, roads, and beaches; each of which reveal different sets of actors, unique histories, and complex negotiations. Rather than simply involving exploitation and marginalization of locals by outside developers, locals' connections to place allow them to claim rights that allow them some participation in the economic growth associated with tourism. Claims to place operate at different scales (local, regional, and national) and provide an important identity category for local residents to claim the right to use and occupy land. By exploring place based identities and their relationship to race, gender, and class, I vi contribute to anthropological literature on identity and regionalism in Brazil. In addition, this work contributes to debate around public spaces, urban development, and land tenure conflicts. vii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thank you to all of the people that helped me complete this dissertation. Thanks to my wife for her support throughout the whole process as well as my children Enzo, Maria, and Eliza for coming along for the ride and making the process more enjoyable. I would especially like to thank everyone in Itacaré who took the time to share their ideas, insights, and support. The aloha and support of the Itacaré surf community was exceptional and helped me feel welcome there. I would like to thank my professors and colleagues at University of California, Santa Cruz for their support and encouragement along the way, especially my Dissertation Committee: Mark Anderson, Andrew Mathews, and Megan Moodie, as well as Daniel Linger who provided valuable insight into Brazilian culture and James Clifford whose perspective helped guide my initial research questions. I would also like to thank the Andrew Mellon Foundation and Fulbright- Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad Program for providing the funding to make this research possible. viii Chapter 1: Introduction The Jesuits established Itacaré in 1723 where the Contas River meets the Atlantic Ocean, a strategic site that provided a safe harbor for ships traveling up and down the coast as well as easy access to the interior up the river. Early visitors to the area came to extract Brazil wood from the heavily forested hills and the river probably served as a port for illegal smuggling of gold and diamonds from the interior. A quilombo, a village of blacks that escaped slavery, developed upstream on the banks of the Contas River as the area remained on the margins of colonial life. As the town developed, local farmers provided manioc flour for the huge sugar cane plantations and slave economy based around Salvador to the north, and eventually became an important port for export of cacao in the late 19th century, a product which transformed Southern Bahia. In the early 20th century, railroads and roads bypassed Itacaré and connected the interior cacao producing areas to the expanded port in Ilhéus, seventy kilometers to the south. Isolated from emerging transportation networks, Itacaré was forgotten, and remained a small, out of the way place until tourism arrived, the most recent boom in a series of boom and bust economic cycles (Meliani 2006). Tourism in Itacaré began with the veranistas, or upper and middle-class families that had summer homes in the city. Many were families who had made money from cacao and kept family homes in the town, even after its importance as a port declined and they moved to larger cities in the region. Later, with the discovery of surf in the late 1970's surfers, backpackers, and more adventurous travelers began slowly arriving, finding a sleepy fishing village that seemed to 1 have been forgotten by time. This changed dramatically with the construction of the highway BR001 in 1998 that connected Itacaré to Ilhéus and the airport in the south. Since the road, tourism has become the economic mainstay with most tourism concentrated during the summer months starting with Christmas and ending with Carnival, in late February or early March. Most of the tourists are Brazilian with 30% of these from Bahia and another 10-15% from abroad (Guiamaraes, Cequeira, & Santana 2007). Leading up to and after the construction of