Doing urban ethnography in a changing world: Building bridges between Portugal and Brazil

Abstract

ETNO.URB (Urban Ethnography Network) is a collaborative international network created in 2016 that brings together Portuguese-speaking social scientists, based mainly in Portugal and Brazil, who use the ethnographic method to tackle different aspects of social life in cities. This presentation aims to discuss a set of recurrent topics of debate within the network: what is the reciprocal intellectual impact of production in the fields of urban sociology and urban studies to understand the current socio-political contexts in Portugal and Brazil? How can urban ethnography contribute to the understanding of agencies, resistances, and the dispute of identities in the main Brazilian and Portuguese cities? How should we approach urban contexts in times of COVID-19 and beyond? Considering previous and current research projects developed within the ETNO.URB network, we will open the debate on the potentialities of urban ethnography and on the power of collective work to understand the complexities of our changing urban world.