Having sprung up in the 16th century, Bairro Alto is a neighborhood located in Lisbon's downtown area and can be considered a typical popular neighborhood, with a predominantly elderly population, which is historically characterized by various forms of bohemian life. In the 1980's, the rise of increased nightlife activities,followed by some changes that occurred in the neighborhood, attracted a growing number of goers from several social networks. The article presents some outcomes from an ethnographical research initiated in 2007, with emphasis on three dimensions: the methodological consequences of the anthropologist's interactions with Portuguese, Brazilian and African persons who frequent the area; the emphasis on observations of a specific street and its sociability dynamics; the reconstitution of some specific networks articulating Bairro Alto night goers.
Neighborhood; Street; Network relationships; Urban ethnography; Nightlife