Architectures of the People: Material and Cultural Politics of Housing in São Paulo, 1950-1995 by José Henrique Bortoluci A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Sociology) in The University of Michigan 2016 Doctoral Committee: Professor George P. Steinmetz, Chair Associate Professor Matthew Hull Assistant Professor Robert S. Jansen Associate Professor Greta R. Krippner Associate Professor Claire A. Zimmerman © José Henrique Bortoluci 2016 All archaeology of matter is an archaeology of humanity. What this clay hides and shows is the passage of a being through time and space, the marks left by fingers, the scratches left by fingernails, the ashes and the charred logs of burned-out bonfires, our bones and those of others, the endlessly bifurcating paths disappearing off into the distance and merging with each other. José Saramago, The cave, p. 66. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS From the moment I began to cultivate the initial ideas for this dissertation on the house as a political and cultural assemblage, I have lived in at least eleven houses in two different cities. These cities could not be more dissimilar: the São Paulo of movement, concrete, traffic, the continuous sensorial excitement that inspires (if it does not drive you mad), and scandalous inequality and the Ann Arbor of cafés and libraries, long and cold winters, running tracks by the river, and a soothing yet sometimes annoying and artificial calm (do not forget Detroit is around the corner). My experience of these two cities, colored by visits to Jaú and Rio de Janeiro whenever possible, are the background and the material of this dissertation. This experience also marks a crucial moment in my life. During these past six years, I resolutely endeavored to challenge the widespread notion that a doctoral program is a hiatus in one’s trajectory, a long immersion in work, a pause from the normalcy of life that should, one hopes, lead to a successful career in academia. I am glad to think that I attempted to live an intense and rewarding life while I navigated these cities, houses, bureaucracies, deadlines, and requirements of all sorts and while I traveled back and forth with my suitcases full of books—and they are heavy! First, I thank the institutions that provided the resources that allowed me to conduct this research. During the six years of my doctoral program, I benefited from the support of Capes and the Fulbright Foundation (Capes-Fulbright Doctoral Fellowship), Rackham Graduate School (Rackham International Research Award and Graduate Student Research iii Grant), the Social Science Research Council (Dissertation Proposal Development Fellowship), the University of Michigan International Institute (Graduate Seminar on Global Transformation), and the University of Michigan Department of Sociology (Dissertation Research Grant). I am also glad I could work in such a stimulating department during these years and that I could profit from the kind and competent assistance of its administration. I am very thankful to my committee members for their guidance and encouragement throughout this process. My chair, George Steinmetz, has been a great source of inspiration, encouragement, and constructive criticism. I deeply admire his erudition and his investment in the world of ideas and research, covering realms well beyond sociology. George is the rare case of an intellectual at a time when universities worldwide reward a blinding segmentation of knowledge. Rob Jansen has been a generous mentor since I started my graduate program, and his impact on my training as a social scientist will long outlast my years at graduate school. I admire his dedication to his students and to the discipline, and I am very pleased I had the chance to work with him on different projects. Greta Krippner helped me strengthen my argument from the first time we discussed my dissertation proposal. Claire Zimmerman played a key role in my initiation in the history of architecture, without which this work would not have been possible. Matt Hull has been a great source of inspiration since our first meeting, and some of his comments at the early stages of this project had a crucial impact on how I conducted fieldwork and how I combined my cases and theories. I also thank other faculty members at the University of Michigan who contributed to this project in so many different ways, especially Peggy Somers, Jeffery Paige, Geneviève Zubrzycki, and Webb Keane. I am very thankful to Kim Greenwell and Marcia Means for their outstanding work in the final editing and proofreading of this dissertation. Additionally, I iv had the opportunity to present partial versions of this work in seminars and conferences in Brazil, and I benefited from the constructive comments of several colleagues there, particularly Mariana Cavalcanti (UERJ), João Ehlert Maia (FGV), and Julia O’Donnell (UFRJ). Oliver Stuenkel has been incredibly supportive since I began teaching at Fundação Getúlio Vargas (FGV). And I will always be thankful to Professors Maria Hermínia Tavares de Almeida, Peter Demant, and Gildo Marçal Brandão (in memoriam) for their unconditional support as I was applying for doctoral programs in the United States. Teaching has been one of the most demanding and rewarding experiences during my doctoral program. My students at Michigan and FGV helped me grow as a teacher, a sociologist, and a human being. I also thank every activist, architect, engineer, and urban planner who shared with me a little of their time, stories, thoughts, and experiences as I was getting to know more about the politics of housing in São Paulo. Many of them opened their homes, studios, offices, and archives to me. This is a privilege that also brings great responsibility. I hope I have honored their generosity. Also, I am grateful to all the librarians and archivists who assisted me during these years. I deeply admire their interest and readiness to help another budding researcher, quite often with contagious joy. Tiago Cavalcanti Guerra, a historian and Cecap Guarulhos resident, was extremely generous is granting me access to the life-history interviews that he and a team of researchers conducted with old Cecap residents. Without his help, the chapter on Cecap would have been completely different. My colleagues and friends at the University of Michigan have played a key role in my life and in the life of this dissertation since 2009. I am grateful for the countless moments of solidarity, kindness, and sheer amusement as we prepared for prelims, workshopped our papers, or spent one of our many evenings at Grizzly Peak. I hope these six years were only v the beginning of a lifetime of friendship and collaboration with Dana Kornberg, Todd Schifeling, Matt Desan, Matt Sullivan, Alix Gould-Werth, Patricia Chen, Danielle Czarnecki, Everett Peachey, Sarah Gram, David Flores, Marco Garrido, Claire Herbert, Atef Said, Ya- Wen Lei, Camilo Leslie, Bonnie Marilyn, Simeon Newman, Alysa Handelsman, Jonathan DeVore, and other friends and colleagues who made the long Michigan winters a lot more pleasant. I also could not thank enough my little Brazilian club in Ann Arbor: Rafael D’Andrea, Pedro Lisbão, and Pedro Cantisano, as well as Cecicle and David’s wonderful family. Of all the gifts and blessings I have ever received, the one that keeps surprising me the most is the fact that I am surrounded by so many precious traveling companions for life. These are friends without whom this journey would be completely different—lonelier, less enjoyable, and definitely less exciting. I like to think that almost everything that I am is a bricolage of their smiles, their gazes, their embraces, and the words that we shared around a table on Rua Augusta or at Guima, on a crowded roof slab in Santa Teresa, in so many late night online chats, or during carnival parades in Rio. Tassia, Ana Letícia, Caio, Talita, Dê, Lu, Badaró, Léo, Débora, Antoine, Jonas, Gabi, Ernesto, Melina, Michele, Xuxu, Danilo, Isa, Vinas, Raquel, Julio, Dib, Fê, Fred, Fatah, and so many other dear friends—I cannot wait for the countless moments we will share in the years to come. My grandma Izaura passed away when I was finishing my third year in the program. She had a prodigious memory and liked to tell stories. A little after I went to school for the first time, as she noticed that I enjoyed that world of books and classrooms, Vó Izaura told me she had learned to read and write at the old house on the farm where she grew up, leafing through her father’s timeworn dictionary after her older brother had taught her the ABCs. She vi told me that for many years she dreamed of stepping inside a classroom, of sitting at a school desk, only to fulfil this dream when my mother—her oldest daughter—began her studies at the age of seven. I have always thought about my grandma visiting a humble rural school in Jaú for the first time. Sometimes, when I enter a new classroom, a library, or a university or even in those very rare moments as a student or as a teacher when a certain lecture or debate fills the room with the excitement of a jazz concert, I think of this enchantment that Vó Izaura must have felt then. It was a spell that she unpretentiously tried to narrate to this grandson, who seemed to appreciate classrooms and books and who, in contrast to my parents and grandparents, would attend several classrooms throughout life—some closer to that rural school in Jaú, and some in faraway lands. It was also grandma Izaura and grandpa Tide—who is still with us and keeps delighting us with his calm presence—whom I had in mind during my first snowstorm in Ann Arbor, in the winter of 2009.