Many urbanist scholars have investigated neighborhoods to better understand the transformation of cities in terms of various interactions between the humans that inhabit spaces to an interconnected web of networks at a global level viewing cities as the unit of analysis (Lipman, 2011; Sassen, 2001; Small, 2004; Zukin, 1989). Drawing from their work, this blog…
Detroit: Still Smoldering
“The phoenix must burn to emerge.” ― Janet Fitch, White Oleander By some accounts, Detroit is a city on the rebound. The rebirth of Detroit has been attributed to a variety of factors. This article will discuss the impact of programs and events leading to the perception of growth and current revenue-generating efforts include…
To hell with good intentions: A look at Henderson-Hopkins’ dreams of integration and their impact on oppressed communities
Classroom knowledge is often treated as an external body of information, the production of which appears to be independent of human beings. From this perspective, objective knowledge is viewed as independent of time and place; it becomes universalized, ahistorical knowledge. Moreover, it is expressed in a language that is basically technical and allegedly value free….
Unfulfilled Plans: Revitalization in Bailey’s Crossroads
If there is one area of Fairfax County that has been targeted and retargeted unsuccessfully for development, it is the Bailey’s Crossroads area of Falls Church, which encompasses the Culmore neighborhood (located on the western side of the area between Leesburg Pike and Columbia Pike in the map below). Known for its traffic congestion and…
The Diamond of the District: Community and Economic Development in Woodridge
The Woodridge neighborhood is bounded by Michigan Avenue NE to the north, Eastern Avenue to the east, Bladensburg Road to the south, and 18th Street NE to the west. Rhode Island Avenue NE runs through the center of the neighborhood. Woodridge began as farmland which was transformed by the introduction of streetcars along Rhode Island…
Richmond’s Youth Movement: The Future of the Southside
In my previous blogs, I introduced Richmond, Virginia’s Southside, provided an abbreviated history of the Manchester District and the surrounding areas, and explored the role of gentrification in the making of Richmond’s segregated Southside. This blog post will consider the future of development and renewal of Richmond’s Southside and what it portends for the future….
Black money, Black power
My first two posts in the Neighborhoods blog series provided a historical overview of my community of choice, Fairwood, located in Prince George’s County, Maryland. As a quick recap, in exploring this affluent predominately African-American community, I learned that a fascinating conundrum exists there: despite the high socioeconomic standing of its residents, most of the…
Deconstructing the social contracts of university-community partnerships
Higher educational leaders have used the term ‘engagement’ to describe a renewed relationship between higher educational institutions and the public they serve (Sandmann & Weerts, 2008). The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, one of the leading organizations of U.S. based education policy and research, defines community engagement as “the collaboration between higher educational…
Neoliberalism, NAFTA, and New Schools
As discussed in previous blogs in this series, the neighborhood of Willow Run in the city of Ypsilanti, Michigan faces dueling pressures given its geographic situation between affluent Ann Arbor and the less economically advantaged city of Detroit. These pressures, coming from both the east and west have situated Ypsilanti…
For Our Consideration: A Look at Culmore through Globalization and CRT
Using a Transformationalist Globalization Lens to Understand Historical Context To fully understand the political context of Culmore, I suggest the use of the transformationalist approach to globalization, which views globalization as a historically contingent process filled with contradictions. The largest paradox is that while globalization is causing greater integration in some areas of geopolitics and…
Bulldozers, HOPE, and History: Gentrification on Richmond’s Southside
In my previous blogs, I introduced Richmond, Virginia’s Southside and provided an abbreviated history of the Manchester District and the surrounding areas. This blog post will explore the role of gentrification in the making of Richmond’s segregated Southside. This gentrification of Richmond’s Southside occurred in waves over a number of years. Gentrification as a Lens…
“But I ain’t no Pollyanna with black skin”: Boundaries in the Knowledge-Economy
To understand the convergence of macro and micro social and cultural behaviors of our world, multidisciplinary theorists have looked to cities as a site of analysis. Within the boundaries of a ‘social city’, researchers deconstruct the ways in which complex socio-cultural processes of globalization and neoliberalism emerge, converge and reproduce power dynamics representative of our…
Hoods, Schools, and People 