Roman Diaforentities. Interdisciplinary insights for urban regeneration in Rome

The essay introduces a research proposal built from a new awareness on the approach to the urban existing heritage acquired after studying the anthropological meaning - not only architectural and spatial - of the concept of border. In his books, the anthropologist Piero Vereni develops the concept of diaforentity as the ability to build and affirm one's own identity thanks to changes that can occur by will or due to unexpected external phenomena. This concept, used as a disciplinary loan for architecture, renews the meanings of non-place and junkspace and overcomes that of resilience for the regeneration or redesign of spaces and architectures modified by time or by catastrophic events. The case study taken to apply this theory is the Mandrione district in Rome, choice due to the recognition of its historical and cultural qualities despite the urban decay in which it lies after the demolition of the shacks built during the World War II.