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Organised by the Centre for Latin American and Caribbean Studies (CLACS)

Speaker: María Florencia Blanco Esmoris (Centro de Investigaciones Sociales (CIS-CONICET/IDES-UNTREF), Argentina)

Textured dreams: Access to Housing, and the Materiality of Home Ownership among Middle Classes in Buenos Aires (Argentina)

Access to housing in cities has returned to the centre of debate in struggles and countless demands in Argentina and around the world. Real estate speculation, the experience of confinement, discussions on the New Rent Law, bank loans with usurious rates, tenants' claims, homelessness and social housing initiatives are some of the scenes that have repositioned the problem of the (im)possibilities of realising the imagined "dream of home ownership" here and beyond Argentina.

In recent years, I have devoted myself to understanding the way in which family trajectories, particularly of those who perceive themselves as belonging to the middle classes, are knotted or unknotted based on access to housing in Greater Buenos Aires. I learned about life stories tied to the search for roots in the host country, meritocratic narratives shattered by the very reality of the new generations and the experience of truncated projects based on the materialities that texturise the housing experience. This presentation covers the results and emergences of my doctoral research carried out between 2016 and 2019 and my complementary research project developed during my confinement.

Image caption: Kitchen in use. Source: Fernando Javier Blanco Esmoris


All are welcome to attend this free seminar, which will be held online via Zoom at 17:00 GMT (UK time). You will need to register in advance to receive the online joining link. Please click on the Book Now button at the top of the page to register.


Programme 2023/24
Autumn Term
November 2 – INAUGURAL SESSION 
November 16 
December 7
 
Winter Term 
January 25
February 15
March 7

The Latin American Ethnography Seminar is a forum in which scholars who conduct ethnographic research in Latin America and the Caribbean can present their work and get feedback in a collaborative environment, as well as build connections between researchers and departments. You can learn more about it here.

The seminar is currently hosted by the ILCS Centre for Latin American and Caribbean Studies (CLACS) at the School of Advanced Study, University of London, in collaboration with the Centre for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean (CRoLAC) at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL), the Centre for Citizenship, Civil Society and the Rule of Law (CISRUL) at the University of Aberdeen, and the Institute of Literature, Language and Anthropology at the Spanish National Research Council.

It is convened by Jessica Sklair (QMUL), Denisse Román-Burgos (University of Aberdeen) and Ainhoa Montoya (SAS & CSIC).

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Please consider supporting CLACS's mission to train the next generation of scholars in Latin American and Caribbean Studies: https://ilcs.sas.ac.uk/research-centres/centre-latin-american-caribbean-studies-clacs/support-clacs


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