Abstract

BONHOMME, Macarena. Racism in multicultural neighbourhoods in Chile: Housing precarity and coexistence in a migratory context. Bitácora Urbano Territorial [online]. 2021, vol.31, n.1, pp.167-181.  Epub June 15, 2021. ISSN 0124-7913.  https://doi.org/10.15446/bitacora.v31n1.88180.

Chile is one of the countries with major destination flows from Latin America and the Caribbean. The aim of this article is to explore social coexistence in residential neighbourhoods in the context of South-South migration, in order to examine the multiple factors at play behind the emerging social conflict between migrants and Chileans. The growing arrival of migrants to Santiago has reinforced racism and the racialization of the urban space through social interactions and practices that take place in residential neighbourhoods. Drawing on a larger research project that consisted in a 17-month ethnography between 2015 and 2018 in one of the most multicultural neighbourhoods of Santiago, this article contributes to unravel racism and the emerging processes of racialization, considering the role that the politics of housing and the housing market play in the intercultural coexistence and the emergent conflict. I argue that the precarious housing conditions in which migrants are forced to live have an impact on the reproduction of racism and the construction of racial hierarchies of belonging that challenge migrants' "right to the city", especially Afro-descendants, deepening their exclusion.

Keywords : migration; racism; housing; social conflict; cultural interaction.

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