The urban houses and the rural heritage: a geographical review on the housing in the city of João Pessoa-PB (Brazil)

Abstract

The Brazilian urban process had been linked to the rural inheritance. That past was supplanted by industrialization, but wasn't been extinguished, although its evidences have been hushed up by the modern society. In João Pessoa, PB (a city on the Northeast of Brazil), the stimulous to the "modernization" were given by the agricultural activities: sugar cane, cotton and cattle raising. The rhythm of the city's growth was the rhythm of the above production mentioned: on its top, the city received improvements and on retroactive city increase, it stopped developing. Therefore, the city urbanization was developed with the rural world. That join is clear on the urban way and on its luxurious houses built by the twentieth-century and other simpler ones found on the city's small rural places express a rural inheritance.