Socio-spatial segregation in Montevideo. "Give place to places": topological cartographies of the city.

Abstract

The central interest of the article is to connect two orders that sometimes appear distant in the study of the city: the social and the spatial. Linking them implies showing that the representations of the city - starting from its neighborhoods, a paradigmatic unit in urban studies - articulate ways of representing the society that is located there. This means adding complexity to the measures usually considered on socio-spatial segregation by incorporating the symbolic dimension implicit in the ways of representing the city and the attributes from which distinctions are made between neighborhoods, which respond to social and not just spatial relationships. Topological cartographies are the configurations that condense the social and spatial representations of the city; They are specified according to the position in the social structure in which the individuals are located. Nine discussion groups on the city of Montevideo are used as empirical material. The analytical procedure topologizes both the urban and the symbolic-social space to map the neighborhoods (as territories) and the attributes assigned to them to define proximity and distances; that is, the criteria of distinction from which the neighborhoods named in the discussion groups approach, move away or oppose them. The analytical procedure topologizes both urban and symbolic-social space to map neighborhoods (as territories) and the attributes assigned to them to define proximity and distances; that is, the criteria of distinction from which the neighborhoods named in the discussion groups approach