Metamorfoseologia urbana: um modo de estudar a cidade a partir de sua metamorfose

Abstract

This thesis proposes a shift in the way we perceive cities. This change involves breaking away from dichotomous distinctions such as nature-culture, life-nonlife, and subject object, as well as rethinking notions of time, form, and transformation. It starts from the premise that thinking through metamorphosis can disrupt conventional ways of understanding cities, deconstructing urban readings that are rooted in static and taxonomic approaches to spatial management inherited from urban morphology. Metamorphosis, a concept borrowed from Emanuele Coccia and enriched by dialogue with many other authors, offers tools to critique this hegemonic vision of the city while proposing alternative perspectives. These perspectives arise from a process of continuous and multiple metamorphosis, stemming from the collective agency of all modes of existence. The work begins with a critical review of urban morphology and its taxonomic methods of engaging with cities, highlighting their limitations and the worldview they perpetuate. From this critique, the thesis seeks to build a theoretical framework centered on movement and the understanding of the world through metamorphosis and multiple relational flows. In addition to Coccia’s concept of metamorphosis, this proposal draws upon Spinoza’s heterarchy, Isabelle Stengers’ notion of complexity, Arturo Escobar’s argument that “all design designs” (todo diseño diseña), Anna Tsing’s politics of slow disturbance, and Elizabeth Povinelli’s geontology, among other key ideas and concepts that are vital to the construction of this thesis. Grounded in the interpretation of these ideas and their connections to the urban context, and based on the premise that changing the way we see alters the way we produce knowledge about the object of study, this work proposes a new way of looking at cities through metamorphosis: an urban metamorphoseology.