Intersecting Geographies

Our Latin American Studies program is glad to invite you to join us for the research presentations of our 2024-25 LAS Graduate Fellows.

The Lopez Sisters: Musical Houses and Performance Geographies in Lima

About the Presentation
This presentation sheds light on the different ways in which music and blackness are integral to the formation of the Black geographies of the South through the case of the López sisters, two Afro-mestizas who own and run a peña criolla—a criollo music venue—in Lima, Peru, since 1974. The criollo music circuit is central to Afro-Limeños identity construction. Criollismo or criollo culture is a mix of different popular traditional expressions of the coast of Peru. It is mainly associated with Limeño's working-class cultural productions such as gastronomy, musical production, and everyday life.  Afroperuanas hold essential roles in criollo culture as cooks, musicians, and performers while being hypersexualized and marginalized by Peruvian society, however, there is a lack of studies of Black women’s geographies from the Global South. By analyzing the position of Afro-mestizas as peña owners and performers of criollo music, my research provides an avenue to understand Afro-descendant women’s spatialities through their participation in criollo culture through performance geographies. Moreover, since the peña is held in the López sisters’ family home, I assess the extent to which the peña can be considered a site of reproduction of urban Blackness in Lima.

About the Presenter
Roxana Escobar Ñañez is an Afro-Peruvian Ph.D. candidate in Human Geography. She also holds a B.A. in Philosophy and a M.A. in Political Science by the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, and M.Ed in Social Justice Education from OISE-UofT. Roxana’s research focuses on the places Afro-Peruvian women hold in Lima’s sonic landscapes. With her project, Roxana seeks to contribute to the geographic knowledge production about black womanhood in Latin America.

Balancing the Right to Housing and to a Healthy Environment in São Paulo, Brazil

About the Presentation
By using the case study of São Paulo, Brazil, my research explores how can a governance system influence the nature of the conflicts between informal housing and environmental protection.
São Paulo, Brazil, is a city – similar to many in the Global South – where the right to housing and the right to a clean environment have been historically in conflict (Maricato, 2003). The city has over 210,000 homes located in informal settlements (i.e. slums) and in areas at risk of floods or landslides. Policies designed to improve people’s safety, provide housing, and protect the environment are generally ineffective, often displacing vulnerable populations without guaranteeing that either right is fulfilled.
I build my argument by combining environmental justice (EJ) theory and public policy literature on governance. EJ research, broadly, explains how historical patterns of policies and government practices have forced marginalized groups to live in areas of environmental risk (Corburn, 2017; Horowitz, 2020). Particularly in the Global South, research has shown the state as a key actor in (re)producing injustices, mainly through allowing informality (Roy, 2016). Although EJ discusses policies, it rarely engages with public policy literature. Within public policy, governance is a useful concept. Governance theories provide insights into “… how different actors, jurisdictions, levels and institutional arenas interact to exchange knowledge and ideas, coordinate action and collaborate in making authoritative decisions that produce collective outcomes.” (Ansell & Torfing, 2022, p.1). Focusing on governance mechanisms that create and maintain environmental injustices is particularly useful. These public policy debates can contribute to EJ research by identifying the mechanisms beyond the enacted policies that can lead to environmental injustices. My research shows ways in which the disconnection between different government departments and non-state actors reproduces spatial inequalities. Specifically, how this disconnection between multiple actors pushes people to informally occupy areas of environmental risk.

About the Presenter
Luísa Duarte Milani is a PhD candidate in Planning at the University of Toronto. She also holds a M.S. in Community and Regional Planning from the University of Texas at Austin, and a B.Arch. in Architecture and Urbanism from the University of São Paulo. Before moving into the field of planning, she worked a few years as an architect and still has a passion for design. While in graduate school, she participated in research projects related to flood resilience both in the USA and Canada. Her current research focuses on environmental justice and informal urban settings in Brazil.