Narratives and public action in the ruins of the Perus Cement Factory

Abstract

In this paper, I interpret the relationship between abandonment and remembrance based on possibilities for re-signifying the Perus Portland Cement Factory. Abandoned since the 1970s, the facilities of the bankrupt Companhia Brasileira de Cimento Portland are today the object of cultural actions organized by social movements in Perus, a district in the northwest of the city of São Paulo. The movements aim to recapture personal and collective memories of the so-called Queixadas Strike, which took over the factory for seven years and left to the territory an identity of struggle for rights and citizenship. Based on the analysis of interviews, I discuss the counter-narrative created by one of these collectives, the Comunidade Cultural Quilombaque, to oppose oblivion and announce the potential of its territory.