Considerações teóricas sobre Identidade de lugar à luz da abordagem histórico-cultural

Abstract

This article brings as main focus of discussion the concept of place-identity. The proposal is, initially, to contextualize the concept from the categories space, place and non-place. This initial discussion aims to understand these categories as semiotic and ideological constructions, which are shaped from the human interactions with the environment beyond the mere physical occupation. Next, we will present the historical-cultural methodology of historical-dialectic materialist base, which will enable the comprehension of the article’s final argumentation. In this stage, the method will be historically approached with the purpose of pointing the fundamental bases to support the vision of man adopted by this study. Finally, we will critically discuss about place-identity. For this task, we elect, as main focus of theoretical revision, the notion defended by Proshansky, Fabian and Kaminoff. We identify that the line of epistemological argumentation of these authors follows a path marked by Dewey’s pragmatism and George Mead’s symbolic interactionism. Therefore, we think that investigating the identification of the people with the environments taking the historicalcultural approach as method demands defining this category not for Proshansky et al.’s model, but epistemologically centered in the cultural-historical method itself, at the risk of theoretical incongruence. This way, we defend a conception of place-identity combined to Bader Sawaya’s theory of affection, where the ethical and political dimension is ontologically connected with the affect. As a result, place-identity is thought not only in terms of identification with the environment, but as possibility of affectionate bond to transform psychosocial reality.