From May 16th to 19th, Mexico City was the location of the 2nd International Congress of Gender and Space, celebrated in conjunction with the 3rd Latin American Seminar of Geography, Gender and Sexuality.
The academic meeting was divided in 39 panel discussions and three magisterial lectures, where different specialists participated to exchange and generate ideas from diverse disciplines and perspectives of the principal theories and methodologies about gender and space.
This year, host institutions were Metropolitan Autonomus University (UAM), including its academic campus Iztapalapa, Azcapotzalco, Cuajimalpa and Xochimilco, and National Autonomus University of Mexico (UNAM) through the Institute of Geography, the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, the Center for Research and Studies of Gender and the University Program of Studies about Cities.
The inauguration at the House of the First Printing Press in the Americas (Casa de la Primera Imprenta) was headed by Doctor Octavio Nateras Dominguez (director of UAM Iztapalapa), Doctor Romualdo López Zarate (director of UAM Azcapotzalco) and Doctor Eduardo Peñalosa Castro (director of UAM Cuajimalpa); and from UNAM by Doctor Naxhelli Ruíz Rivera (Academic secretary of the Institute of Geography); Doctor Hortensia Moreno Esparza (Research coordinator of the Center for Research and Studies of Gender); and Doctor Javier Delgado (Director of the University Program of Studies about Cities). The partakers exposed coincidently the importance of developing researches from a territorial perspective, but also stated that the congress would be an important scenario to promote collaborative academic networks for enriching the gender-space debate.
The director of PUEC, Doctor Javier Delgado, expressed that gender-space perspective is mandatory to construct a democratic city. Also, asserted that, historically, essential decisions about the design of urban space have been developed by men and certain social groups which have resulted in unequal and exclusionary cities. In this sense, reflections about gender based inequalities are necessary to construct the city of the future and promote different strategies to empower women and girls.
