L’espace construit en Amérique latine coloniale. Perspectives d’étude

This paper discusses the limitations of research on Mexican architecture and urbanism when done from an artistic or technological approach which result in works that deal exclusively with the object, following a European perspective that doesn’t take into consideration indigenous contributions in the construction of space in New Spain (Mexico) and even less, contributions to European space from the New World. Furthermore, here habitable space is proposed as an object of study (on distinct scales – that of territory, human settlements and architecture – and different levels of concretion – abstract, physical and as experience) by way of the observation of social processes and the physical environment in order to understand space in its social dimension as a signification tool, a field of negotiation, the stage for social relations and a diagram of mental representation. The article deals with the period of sixteenth century as the moment where the hybridization of three cultures – European, sedentary American and nomadic American – laid the foundations for the construction of New Hispanic and current day space in Mexico.