The boundaries between the public and the private redefined in the face of sanitary confinement in two urban neighborhoods, Mexicaltzingo y San Antonio, Guadalajara, México

Abstract

This document has as its goal to reflect on the meaning of neighborhoods as a space of community life, which includes setting the rules in which neighbors coexist as well as the space they share, particularly speaking on the forms that communities classify, as private or public, the areas within their neighbourhoods.

We will examine these ideas from the proxemics of Edward Hall, the categorization of activities happening either in private or public spaces to establish the limits between one another. Two urban intervention projects will be checked: a pocket park and an archeological site established as a museum, both developed during the pandemic (2019-2021), when private spaces were isolated and public spaces avoided. Both projects created expectations for both neighborhoods, one was full of hope, valued, and had a positive impact on the interaction between neighbors; while the other one just created disagreements and a sense of danger for their privacy, their only defense during the pandemic.

The following document pretends to contribute to the ways on which the urban management approaches to social and cultural dynamics of urban community. Said community impose rules and values to urbanistic actions that technically are fit in any context.