Occupying hope: notes from a university Occupy experience in Brazil

Resumen

This article proposes a reflection on the Occupy movements that took place in Brazilian universities over the last months of 2016 from a perspective inspired by pragmatic sociology and utopian studies. Based upon the texts "Styles" by Marielle Macé and Ernst Bloch's "The Principle of Hope", the article proposes a reflection on the occupation experience and the way in which its formal aspects (gestures, organization, style) produce new forms of resistance expression. We argue that such practices relaunch social transformation utopias and, in doing so, renew the repertoire of criticism to the current forms of life. Thereby, this reflection is based on the idea that a combined approach between pragmatic sociology and utopian studies makes it possible to thematize the Occupy movement from its "style". On the one hand, we seek to approach forms of experience in their potential to accomplish values from which the very ways of life are in question. On the other hand, we intend to (re)open the question of “how” in life (its performances, its rhythms, its use of time) to sew the critical connection of the multiple points of refusal therein expressed.