Segregation has been one of the most persistent features of urban life and, accordingly, one of the main subjects of enquiry in urban studies. Stemming from a tradition that can be traced back to the Chicago School in the early twentieth century, social segregation has been seen as the natural consequence of the social division of space. Such naturalized understanding of segregation as ‘territorial segregation' takes space as a surrogate for social distance. We propose a shift in the focus from the static segregation of places—where social distance is assumed rather than fully explained—to how social segregation is reproduced through embodied urban trajectories. We aim to accomplish this by exploring the spatial behaviour of different social groups as networks of movement that constitute opportunities for co‐presence. This alternative view recasts the original idea of segregation as ‘restrictions on interaction' by concentrating on the spatiality of segregation potentially active in the circumstances of social contact and encounters in the city. This approach to segregation as a subtle process that operates ultimately through trajectories of the body is illustrated by an empirical study in a Brazilian city.

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Integrating social and spatial networks will be critical to new approaches to cities as systems of interaction. In this paper, we focus on the spatial and temporal conditions of encounters as a key condition for the formation of social networks. Drawing on classic approaches such as Freeman’s concept of segregation as ‘restriction on contact’, Hägerstrand’s time-geography, and recent explorations of social media locational data, we analysed the space-time structure of potential encounters latent in the urban trajectories of people with different income levels in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This approach allows us to estimate trajectories examining spatiotemporal positions in tweets, and assess spaces of potential encounter and levels of social diversity on the streets. Finally, we discuss the utility and limitations of an approach developed to grasp how clusters of encounters between groups with different income levels are produced.

A integração de redes sociais e espaciais é fundamental para novas abordagens a cidades como sistemas de interacção. Neste artigo, propomos uma maneira de analisar as condições espaciais e temporais do encontro como condição da formação de redes sociais. Reunindo abordagens clássicas como a geografia temporal de Hägerstrand e o conceito de segregação como ‘restrição de contato’ de Freeman, e explorações recentes de dados de localização via mídia digital, analisamos a estrutura espaço-temporal de encontros potenciais nas trajetórias urbanas de usuários do Twitter diferenciados por níveis de renda no Rio de Janeiro. Esta abordagem permite estimar as posições dos usuários, visualizar grupos de renda e suas trajetórias no espaço urbano, identificar espaços de encontro potencial e os níveis de diversidade e segregação nos espaços públicos. O artigo conclui com uma discussão dos achados empíricos e a utilidade desta ‘geografia temporal dos encontros’ potenciais na cidade, possível a partir da introdução de novas tecnologias de comunicação digital móvel.

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