E BRASILIA, O QUE É? DIGA LÁ, MEU IRMÃO Concepções sobre os limites territoriais da capital do Brasil

AFTER ALL, WHAT IS BRASÍLIA? YOU TELL ME, MY BROTHER Conceptions on the territorial limits of the capital of Brazil

Abstract

The city of Brasília is full of symbolic meanings. It is the headquarters of the powers of the Republic, a city that is still young and was marked by migration. The federal capital offers its residents a complex context for an identity formation, often strained by disputes over meanings. Controversy surrounds the comprehension of the city’s territorial base. Contrarily to a typical city, Brasília is formed by discontinuous urban patches. It is a city made up of different urban unities. They range from large urban unities as the satellite towns and a central area, named Plano Piloto, to the urban gated communities, increasingly installed in the rural interregnum existing in the capital since its foundation. We propose presenting different conceptions on the (territorial) meanings of Brasília which are based, mainly, on two extremes. On one side, we have those who support a more restricted territorial comprehension with limits reduced to the initial plan of the city; on the other side, there are those who believe the capital city has more extensive boundaries, expanding the meaning of ‘what is Brasília’ and closer to a territorial configuration of Distrito Federal. Finally, both conceptions are based on colliding urban and political perspectives. While the first is associated with a more conservative comprehension of the city, the second is based on the recognition of the shifting and fluid dynamics of urban life.