Cultura como comunidade imaginada

uma crítica à abordagem ontológica da cultura nos estudos geográficos

Abstract

The traditional approaches of anthropology that
dealt with superstructures capable of shaping the behavior of an expressive set of individuals are still present in the geographical debate. The strength of Kroeber's superorganic approach and the paradigms constructed by the Berkeley school are part of the contemporary geographical mindset, which helps us explain the ontological conception of culture. In this case, culture is treated as a delimitable and describable entity, leaving aside the advances of modern anthropology. Breaking with the ontological conception of culture, we defend the idea that the concept refers to an imagined community, similar to what Benedict Anderson considered about the idea of nation. This kind of understanding frees the geographical analysis of vices such as the demobilization of efforts for social justice, the suppression of geography in the exercise of otherness, the reified reproduction of the ontological approach in teaching materials, and the inadequacy of the cartographic representation of culture. It is our goal to critically present these consequences.