African Heritage in Porto Maravilha: Rio de Janeiro at the Crossroads of Past and Future

• In Event: Patrimonialización y transformaciones urbanas y regionales

Abstract

In 2011, workers digging a tunnel as part of the Porto Maravilha infrastructure upgrades in downtown Rio uncovered the remains of the Cais do Valongo, purported to be the largest slave port in the Americas. This event put in sharp relief the degree to which Porto Maravilha, the largest public private partnership in Brazilian history, was creating a modern "global city" on top of a delicate urban landscape with a complex and painful past. With the goal of attracting tens of thousands of new residents and millions of square feet of commercial real estate to an area currently inhabited by a largely Afro-Brazilian population through new transportation infrastructure, fiscal incentives, and cultural institutions, the neighborhood is poised to transform significantly.

In planning for this transformation, the City of Rio. through its Rio World Heritage Institute and Port Area Urban Redevelopment Corporation (CDURP), has addressed head-on the question of how to preserve, memorialize, and engage the neighborhood's Afro-Brazilian past and present. However, such public rhetoric contrasts with major investments like the Museum of the Future, whose very name suggests otherwise.

This paper will analyze the cultural planning component in the context of the greater urban redevelopment project of Porto Maravilha, including such aspects as funding for cultural projects and institutions, current and proposed architecture and urban design elements that acknowledge the neighborhood's Afro-Brazilian heritage, and the expected socio-economic impacts of Porto Maravilha on this community.

Author

• Gregory Scruggs, Columbia University