Paper short abstract:

In this text I present some thoughts about the Maison du Brésil. My objective is to research this temporary residency for researchers through the meanings that characterize it as a Brazilian territory in Paris and through the very belonging to the category elite as a peculiarity of its residents.

Paper long abstract:

The Maison du Brésil is one of the 40 residences that make part of the architectural set of Paris's Cité Internationale Universitaire. Some of these residencies (around 23) have a "national character" and are responsible for hosting graduate students and researchers during a temporary period. The CIUP was conceived in the 1920's, being meant by its main idealizer, André Honorat, as an international space for integration of the intellectual elites in formation in French soil. In this text I present some thoughts about the Maison du Brésil. My objective is to research this temporary residency for researchers through the meanings that characterize it as a Brazilian territory in Paris and through the very belonging to the category elite as a peculiarity of its residents. I wish to analyze the international circulation of students and researchers that live there and have an educational experience of multiple dimensions as experiences of deterritorialization of identities and its consequences in a housing space which is at the same time public and private. Based on documental analysis and ethnographic fieldwork I present some aspects of the history and the everyday life of the Maison du Brésil. Also I intend to show how the meanings of Brazilianness are used as support for the identity crisis lived by the members of a supposed Brazilian elite in Paris, as I analyze the particularities of the mediations established by the residents of the Maison du Brésil, in the formation and international insertion of some researchers.

Paper Download (278 KB)