visions and representations of the urban transformation of buga (colombia), 1900-1937

This article offers an interpretation of the representations that make the elites in the Buga City (Colombia) regarding the process of transformation in its urban setting in the early twentieth century. This problem is addressed to investigate modernization, changes and receptions within the elites of this locality. This paper investigates the valuations made regarding betterment of space through the modernization of the city and improvement of its inhabitants in the moral, cultural and hygienic. To explore these research problems were used concepts as Bourdieu´s "symbolic capital", the Moscovici´s definition of "social representation" and contributions of authors like Geertz, Chartier, Kingman and others. Urban change in the press and the minutes of the City Council was explored  as spaces of expectations and experiences that stimulated speeches, debates and representations. This work relativized the opposition between the modern and the traditional in the locality, because the representations realized the ability of elites to involve the universal with their specific needs of social distinction, creation of civility and morality, as well as the creation of identity referents.