A Narrative of Resistance: The A Brief History of the Dandara Community, Brazil

: This paper presents a brief report on the history of the Dandara Occupation, in the city of Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Using a Through a general panorama of the strategies and resistance of the residents and movements involved;, this paper shows the importance of the occupied territory in the struggle for the right to housing in the city. Through the narratives of the residents, references, and photographic remnants of the initial years of the occupation, a temporal line is developed to till the present day is developed, which that reveals the challenges and opportunities for the people of Dandara in the development making of their community.


Introduction
The city of Belo Horizonte, capital of the Minas Gerais State in the Southeast Region of Brazil, is one of the few planned cities in the country. However, since its creation, its peripheral neighborhoods hinterlands have been become characterized by poverty in the peripheral neighborhoods. The form in which Belo Horizonte was built forced the working-class population to stay out of the planned circle. Therefore, the creation conception of Belo Horizonte in its conception presented the idea that of housing in the formal city as is a privilege (e.g., see for example, Fernandes (2017)).
The original structure of the city, along with many other social and economic processes, is evident in reveals the current, high inequalities that are reproduced within it. A study of the João Pinheiro Foundation (FJP) points outshows that Minas Gerais has the second second-largest housing deficit in the country: in 2014, Minas Gerais lacked 529,000 housing units. In the Metropolitan Region of Belo Horizonte (RMBH), nNeither the private sector nor the government housing programs (the largest of these being "Programa Minha Casa, Minha Vida",," PMCMV-My House, My Life, Program) were able to solve this problem in the Metropolitan Region of Belo Horizonte (RMBH).
Instead, the housing deficit in RMBH increases year-on-year.
The housing deficit is a social issue where lack of access to a housinge is a consequence of market logic. Real estate market supply is so expensive and its access so bureaucratic that it becomes unfeasible for a large proportion of the poorest members layers of society to obtain a home through the formal channels. Moreover than that, since housing is treated by the market as a financial asset, there are many properties thatmany properties are left unoccupied as a form of housing speculation.
This situation in the Metropolitan Region of Belo Horizonte has led to a severe drastic increase in the The Dandara Community was created within such a social framework. Dandara dreamed, and dreamed aloud, of promoting a new way of dwelling; a conception beyond the established model market of the exploitation of peripheral subjects in large centers. With intense debates about regarding the right to housing, and severe criticism of the housing deficit in this city that belongs to the only a few, Dandara was constituted through struggle.

Dandara's History in Photographss and Memory
The Dandara community is located in the Pampulha region (a zone of high real estate value), in Belo Horizonte (Minas Gerais, Brazil). In the early hours of 9 April 9, 2009, a group of 150 homeless families occupied a territory-like a "sea of canvas tents"-on a piece of land that did not conform to its social function. Since then, along with the social movements Brigadas Populares (BPs), Comissão Pastoral da Terra (CPT), and Movimento dos Sem Terra (MST), those 150 families started to build their own houses, giving rise to. The the Dandara Community was born.
Once the territory was occupied, the Brigadas Populares (a political organization and social movement) took on the processes of organization and resistance along with the residents. It sought to promote the maintenance and self-construction of housing on the land. In the first few days, news of the occupation gained national attention. The media coverage further increased the number of families that joined the occupation process. In three days, the occupation increased from 150 to 1086 families. "It was nice because it happened like this, it was a surprise that we had to work so Commented [A4]: I have suggested replacing "layers" with "members" as it is individual people who wish to obtain homes. An alternative would be: "the poorest families in society". Please accept the expression that best reflects your original intended meaning.
Commented [A5]: I have suggested deleting "housing" here, as this is understood.

Commented [A8]
: I have suggested using the full word "photographs" as this is more formal. In the following days, due to this phenomenon, there were intensifiedying calls for resistance and securing access to the land. security to stay on the land. Dwellers, members of social movements, and support networks all started to organize daily assemblies. Here, the dwellers defined questions that addressed such themes as the logic of the self-managed space, its organization, and structure, as well as strategies beyond the '"occupied'" territory.
From the articulation of the CPT, a support network was born. At In the beginning, this was composed of religious affiliates of the Catholic church, but later it expanded to include public lawyers, social architects, and political scientists, along with other professionals. Important agents of these networks were groups from universities, including undergraduate and graduate students who also became involved in the daily challenges of the expanding occupation.
Commented [A10]: I have suggested maintaining the past tense, as you are describing events that happened in the past.

Commented [A11]:
The phrase "security to stay on the land" was not clear. I have suggested "securing access to the land". Please review this carefully to check that it correctly reflects your original intended meaning.

Commented [A12]
: I have suggested inserting the word "include" to improve the flow of the sentence.