“My neighborhood is beautiful but dangerous”: redefining the neighborhood in contexts of criminal violence

Abstract

This article analyzes how children living in a context of criminal violence in Ciudad Obregón, Sonora (Mexico), construct meanings about their neighborhood and develop situated interpretations of danger and safety. Using a qualitative approach, grounded in the constructivist paradigm and employing a narrative design, the research gathers the voices of twelve children between the ages of 10 and 13 through participatory workshops and in-depth interviews conducted in two elementary schools located in a neighborhood with a high incidence of violence. The thematic-relational analysis of the narratives allowed for the identification of patterns of meaning linked to the spatial experience of violence.

The findings show that the neighborhood is constructed ambivalently: simultaneously as a space of affection and belonging, and as a territory traversed by risks associated with criminal activity. The children create “children’s cartographies of fear,” understood as symbolic maps that delineate forbidden zones, safe routes, and permitted times, thus guiding their daily movements. Far from demonstrating desensitization to violence, their narratives reveal interpretive agency, ethical judgments, and self-protection strategies that allow them to maintain a sense of certainty in an unstable environment. Likewise, gender inequalities are identified in the regulation of mobility, which more intensely restrict girls' spatial experience.

This study contributes to social studies of childhood by problematizing violence as a situated experience inscribed within social space, highlighting children's capacity to create meaning beyond approaches focused exclusively on vulnerability.