Sustainable flood memory in Brazil: A transnational approach

The UK ‘Sustainable Flood Memories’ project (2011–2014) and publications were shared with Brazilian researchers from the ‘Waterproofing Data’ project (2019–2022) to develop a transnational methodology for eliciting flood memories from local communities located in flood-prone areas. What has been striking about the collaboration is the similarities in terms of emotions, knowledge, tradition around flood experiences, and adaptation despite radically different socio-cultural and economic contexts alongside the significant differences in terms of relationships/dependence upon the state, water governance systems, and approaches to sustainability. This article draws upon the creative work we did in generating Brazilian memories of flood events (drawing upon the methodology of the Museu da Pessoa) in the cities of São Paulo and Rio Branco, two very different locations, and compares these to the sustainable flood memory research in the UK. We explore what a transnational and multi-directional approach to the past and present narratives of remembering and forgetting of floods in variable contexts has to offer. Our findings bring lessons for how the arts and humanities can be brought to bear upon flood risk management in variable contexts of water governance by showing how trans-memorialization, commemorative, and storytelling methods can provide solidarity across national containers of water politics and management.