SOCIO-SPATIAL DIFFERENTIATION

Abstract

“Spatial differentiation” is a key issue in Geography; this can be easily verified in the vast bibliography on the theme. “Socio-spatial differentiation”, however, adds a certain “quality” to the issue of differentiation, for it leads us to direct the focus of analysis onto the social determinations of the spatial process. This theoretical movement, on the other hand, requires that we treat spatial differentiation and its practical accomplishments as a moment of social reproduction. Geographical space is socially produced, i.e., it is the outcome of the act of producing life; therefore, socio-spatial practice is the basis and the support of life. Space must be analyzed as process and movement; as social production/reproduction. This means that it must also clarify the contents of such process. In order to accomplish this, space must be understood as a condition/mean and as a product of social reproduction.