Informal settlements: Reinterpreting rural imaginary in urban areas: The case of Valparaiso's ravines

Abstract This article aims to reveal and highlight the socio-spatial processes related to the establishment, reorganisation and consolidation of rural life in informal settlements in the urban ravines of Valparaiso, as shown through social representations of inhabitants. These urban neighbourhoods located in the ravines of Valparaiso are a complex socio-spatial reality embedding meaning, representations, and social imaginaries associate with rural life. To understand the logic of this kind of appropriation of space in the ravines settlements, we worked with and studied the key players, the inhabitants who showed and revealed from their experiences, expectations and actions this imaginary reconstruction of rural life in urban areas.