METAMORPHOSES BETWEEN OBLIGATIONS AND FEARS: an ethnographic essay on socio-spatial experiences of residents of rural communities in the São Luís – ma metropolitan region

Abstract

In this present research, I intend to expose some field notes about my doctorate research in progress in four small communities considered rural in the metropolitan region of São Luís / MA. I try to raise considerations about aspects that have stood out in the work, which may lead to the main axes of analysis in the future process construction of the thesis. Maracanã, Alegria, Vila Mochel and Quilômetro 21 are communities impacted in many different ways by the recent residential implementations of the Minha Casa Minha Vida Program. Residents established for a long time in these communities have developed a way of life where relations with their ancestors, saints and enchanted ones involve chains of obligations and a sense of tradition, expressed in festive practi\ces. Contact with violence via the state policy, imposing housing standards with aggressive socioenvironmental characteristics and contact with violence via drug trafficking have been producing a complex sociability interspersed with distinct fears in this region.

Keywords: Maracanã Region; Minha Casa Minha Vida Program; Fear; Obligation; Tradition.