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| In addition to natural hazard vulnerability, the lack of access to basic infrastructure and financial services imposes restricted production and consumption conditions for this population, as well as limits technological innovations that for some privileged experts, would be promising for reducing our environmental degradation [2]. Hence, when thinking along the United Nation’s promise of “leaving no one behind” for a sustainable future, one must think – What is really possible in marginalized, peripheral, poor contexts?
In my diverse experiences in social projects in Brazil, I came to face situations where from the lack of options, these populations have been actively resisting their existence through informal and creative ways of production, consumption and education. Ways that have been excluded from the respect of government officials and policymakers, but that we can learn from to ressignify our modus operandis that have overpassed the bearable impact on the planet.
I bring to the discussion the practice of mutirão, a word with indigenous roots from Tupi-Guarani mutyrõ (within many other variations), freely translated to English as “common work”. The practice, with debated origin [3], has been present in diverse cultural contexts and geographical regions, suggesting a common intrinsic human trace of solidarity [3], but that aggregates different layers of political and social challenges. Deteriorated by the growing individualization of work configuration, some practices of mutual help survive their remote past’s heritage [3], yet incorporating new complexities of contemporary urban configuration.
In Brazilian cities, despite the legal effort to make cities accessible [4], these challenges include housing deficit, lack of basic services such as sanitation and electricity, and restricted land access [5]. In the overall neglect of this urban ill by some government officials, it creates a condition that obliges people to find informal ways of occupying the city – usually in configurations such as favelas, and ocupações. In these scenarios of poor infrastructure assistance, climate vulnerability is enhanced, being common phenomena of landslides, extreme rainfall and floods that cause significant dwelling damage and human loss. Yet invisibilized by officials, the segregated people find political and social strength by unification of their voices, knowledge and workforce abilities in a territory that is not assisted by formal governance. They collectively construct housing, infrastructure, and collective spaces in labor that are generally non-remunerated, non-hierarchical, and do not aim for a financial profit. Therefore, the mutirão incorporates a political view of anti-hegemonic activity that is contrary to capitalist work relations [6].
To bring this into practical terms, I share a practice of an informal occupation located in Santa Maria, a city in south of Brazil, that is in a current legislative process for the State to formally allow 53 families to live where they have been for the past seven years – “Vila Resistência” – in direct translation – “Villa of Resistance”. The name coherently suggests their will of power, as 15 of the pioneer families came from a situation of eviction from a past land they occupied, and in the current site, they have already been through at least three direct threats of removal [7]. The disputatious situation introduces other various conflicts these organizations encounter, and their need to urgently resist to be able to live.
In addition to natural hazard vulnerability, the lack of access to basic infrastructure and financial services imposes restricted production and consumption conditions for this population, as well as limits technological innovations that for some privileged experts, would be promising for reducing our environmental degradation [2]. Hence, when thinking along the United Nation’s promise of “leaving no one behind” for a sustainable future, one must think – What is really possible in marginalized, peripheral, poor contexts?In my diverse experiences in social projects in Brazil, I came to face situations where from the lack of options, these populations have been actively resisting their existence through informal and creative ways of production, consumption and education. Ways that have been excluded from the respect of government officials and policymakers, but that we can learn from to ressignify our modus operandis that have overpassed the bearable impact on the planet.
I bring to the discussion the practice of mutirão, a word with indigenous roots from Tupi-Guarani mutyrõ (within many other variations), freely translated to English as “common work”. The practice, with debated origin [3], has been present in diverse cultural contexts and geographical regions, suggesting a common intrinsic human trace of solidarity [3], but that aggregates different layers of political and social challenges. Deteriorated by the growing individualization of work configuration, some practices of mutual help survive their remote past’s heritage [3], yet incorporating new complexities of contemporary urban configuration.
In Brazilian cities, despite the legal effort to make cities accessible [4], these challenges include housing deficit, lack of basic services such as sanitation and electricity, and restricted land access [5]. In the overall neglect of this urban ill by some government officials, it creates a condition that obliges people to find informal ways of occupying the city – usually in configurations such as favelas, and ocupações. In these scenarios of poor infrastructure assistance, climate vulnerability is enhanced, being common phenomena of landslides, extreme rainfall and floods that cause significant dwelling damage and human loss. Yet invisibilized by officials, the segregated people find political and social strength by unification of their voices, knowledge and workforce abilities in a territory that is not assisted by formal governance. They collectively construct housing, infrastructure, and collective spaces in labor that are generally non-remunerated, non-hierarchical, and do not aim for a financial profit. Therefore, the mutirão incorporates a political view of anti-hegemonic activity that is contrary to capitalist work relations [6].
To bring this into practical terms, I share a practice of an informal occupation located in Santa Maria, a city in south of Brazil, that is in a current legislative process for the State to formally allow 53 families to live where they have been for the past seven years – “Vila Resistência” – in direct translation – “Villa of Resistance”. The name coherently suggests their will of power, as 15 of the pioneer families came from a situation of eviction from a past land they occupied, and in the current site, they have already been through at least three direct threats of removal [7]. The disputatious situation introduces other various conflicts these organizations encounter, and their need to urgently resist to be able to live.
In addition to natural hazard vulnerability, the lack of access to basic infrastructure and financial services imposes restricted production and consumption conditions for this population, as well as limits technological innovations that for some privileged experts, would be promising for reducing our environmental degradation [2]. Hence, when thinking along the United Nation’s promise of “leaving no one behind” for a sustainable future, one must think – What is really possible in marginalized, peripheral, poor contexts?
In my diverse experiences in social projects in Brazil, I came to face situations where from the lack of options, these populations have been actively resisting their existence through informal and creative ways of production, consumption and education. Ways that have been excluded from the respect of government officials and policymakers, but that we can learn from to ressignify our modus operandis that have overpassed the bearable impact on the planet.
I bring to the discussion the practice of mutirão, a word with indigenous roots from Tupi-Guarani mutyrõ (within many other variations), freely translated to English as “common work”. The practice, with debated origin [3], has been present in diverse cultural contexts and geographical regions, suggesting a common intrinsic human trace of solidarity [3], but that aggregates different layers of political and social challenges. Deteriorated by the growing individualization of work configuration, some practices of mutual help survive their remote past’s heritage [3], yet incorporating new complexities of contemporary urban configuration.
In Brazilian cities, despite the legal effort to make cities accessible [4], these challenges include housing deficit, lack of basic services such as sanitation and electricity, and restricted land access [5]. In the overall neglect of this urban ill by some government officials, it creates a condition that obliges people to find informal ways of occupying the city – usually in configurations such as favelas, and ocupações. In these scenarios of poor infrastructure assistance, climate vulnerability is enhanced, being common phenomena of landslides, extreme rainfall and floods that cause significant dwelling damage and human loss. Yet invisibilized by officials, the segregated people find political and social strength by unification of their voices, knowledge and workforce abilities in a territory that is not assisted by formal governance. They collectively construct housing, infrastructure, and collective spaces in labor that are generally non-remunerated, non-hierarchical, and do not aim for a financial profit. Therefore, the mutirão incorporates a political view of anti-hegemonic activity that is contrary to capitalist work relations [6].
To bring this into practical terms, I share a practice of an informal occupation located in Santa Maria, a city in south of Brazil, that is in a current legislative process for the State to formally allow 53 families to live where they have been for the past seven years – “Vila Resistência” – in direct translation – “Villa of Resistance”. The name coherently suggests their will of power, as 15 of the pioneer families came from a situation of eviction from a past land they occupied, and in the current site, they have already been through at least three direct threats of removal [7]. The disputatious situation introduces other various conflicts these organizations encounter, and their need to urgently resist to be able to livTransformative learning for sustainable transition uses multiple frameworks on various scales that formulate normative goals. In Reader #7 authors bring together concerns, challenges, and take aways from exploring frameworks and policies on the ground, such as UN Sustainable Development Goals, European Union’s Just Transition policies, the Inclusive Design Overlay, to RIBA Plan of Work, and differing universities’ educational structures. How can we translate the expectations raised in legal frameworks, visionary policies, and mechanisms into tangible practices, and how can we learn from our experiences to make real change? While the authors operate in varying interstices between disciplines—municipalities, young people, museums, universities, and an architectural education at the crossroads of defining sustainable design practices locally and breaking away from a colonial educational system—they share the pursuit for building new practices, relations, and ultimately professional identities. The papers describe the complexities of entering unknown territory and being affected by social orders and frameworks. Everything happens in the encounter.
At the Learnings/Unlearnings conference we sit densely packed in one of the project rooms of the art space Färgfabriken, taking part in the session on media and mediation. Indira Lemouchi invites us to sonic exercises of connecting to the environment and to each other. Crowded, concentrated, hectic, we make space and time for our sonic agencies. Indira orchestrates our voices, sounds, and breaths. Raising our voices—or rather our unfamiliar bodily tones in togetherness—we get louder, pause, get out of breath. Drawings accompany the sounds and the instructions, but maybe our mind has made that up after all this time. The joyful experience of our sonic collaborative agencies stayed, however, and its creation is reflected in the contribution “Sensing children’s Agencies and Sonic Ecologies Through Participatory Practice,” sharing exercises, experiences with children and the conceptualisation of sounding and listening.
A series of more-than-human adventures is offered by Teresa Elkin Postila. In “Preschool Children’s Watery Relations and Realities — Adventures in Multiple Timeplaces,” she describes pre-school children’s encounters with water. Based on concepts of contact zones and scales, developed by feminist theorists, Elkin Postila has created situations with children, researchers, and pedagogues in which water becomes explored as timeplace, imaginary, and a hydrosocial cycle. Her approach recognises the young child as a social actor with the capacity to effect change in the present.
Emilio Brandao in “‘This is my Hammarkullen…’— Listening to Community Storytelling” describes a community course for audiovisual narratives in Hammarkullen, a late modern city district of Göteborg in Sweden, where many cultures live together. With his brother, Daniel Brandao, he developed this method for architecture students, that was then further developed with local residents, and later evolved into an extensive course in collaboration with a people’s university where participants produced autobiographical films. Unveiling generous insights into the daily lives and concerns of the people living in Hammarkullen, the project contributes to reclaiming the narratives of their own life-environments.
Also using an audiovisual method, Wanjiru E Karanja reports from “Amplifying Youth Voices: A Photovoice Approach in Pedagogical Settings,” which she applied in a school setting in Brisbane, Australia. Equipped with a photovoice instruction booklet and a questionnaire, students were asked to explore their environments in terms of active, social, wellbeing and intergenerational spaces, as well as barriers. The study was part of a research project addressing inclusive campus environments with the aim to explore how spatial practice can promote health, well-being, and social belonging through the design of school environments. The audiovisual media captured students’ voices underscoring their experiences in their everyday environments.
In “Re-/Non-reading Fragments: Inventories for Architectural Thinking,” Sezin Sarıca investigates how inventories of fragments can operate as generative tools within architectural thinking and design pedagogy. Sarıca proposes the acts of re-reading and non-reading as complementary modes of engaging architectural materials, enabling both critical reinterpretation and intuitive exploration. Through pedagogical workshops and speculative drawing research, the study demonstrates how inventory-making can expand the methods through which architectural knowledge is produced and represented.
“Playing in Tamed and Wild Environments: Five Steps to Learning (and Unlearning) with Artistic Methods in Non-Artistic Disciplines” is a paper contributed by EcoJust Studio, namely Isabel Löfgren, Tatiana Sokolova and Oldouz Nejadi, following another orchestrated encounter at the conference. Combining storytelling approaches, bodily exercises, creating a shared keyword forest, and rediscovering language in small group conversations collectively, EcoJust Studio invited the conference audience to practice what they call “untaming” of higher education to respond to current urgencies.
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