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This Halloween, Sean Clancy had the most original costume in his southern Pennsylvania neighborhood. The base layer of his costume wasn’t very exciting at all- a flannel shirt, jeans and boots. However, the next layer really made Clancy’s costume memorable. He tucked a street sign into his belt and draped a GAP bag from his left pocket. He hung a Coke can from his thigh and pinned a Sunoco gas rebate banner on his right knee. A KFC sign was just above his left knee, and Clancy’s mask was a US road atlas. Even among all the goblins, ghouls, ghosts, and Lord of the Rings characters, Clancy was the scariest creature of them all. Urban Sprawl.
Since the emergence of prefabricated housing in preplanned neighborhoods in the 1950s, the Pleasantville ethic has brought more than half of the country’s population to the suburbs. Yet while the suburban value system has improved the quality of our lives, it has tarnished the quality of our character. This trend of modernization was recognized by Henry David Thoreau more than a century ago, when he wrote that “While society has been improving our homes, it has not improved the men who are to inhabit them. It has created palaces, but it has not been so quick to create noblemen and kings.” It seems that today’s kings and queens lord over backyard bar-b-q’s, and ride in SUV chariots. But the purpose of this speech isn’t to criticize these kings and queens. What I take issue with is the society that makes them royalty. Herein lies the problem: Our society has come to idealize a destructive vision of the American way of life—one that puts up white picket fences to keep out our neighbors. Rather than valuing what the suburbs used to stand for—community and opportunity—now we first, embrace isolation, and second endorse exclusion.
Clancy’s roadmap Halloween mask may have been clever—but it was probably useless. Roads connecting the suburbs to other locations spring up so fast, maps can’t keep up. Many parts of the country lack public transportation that would integrate our communities rather than isolate them. According to the April 28, 2002 New York Times Magazine, “In most parts of the country, people now spend more on transportation than on medical care, education, clothing and entertainment- combined.” In Atlanta, the average person wa...
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... can’t change the ours in the work week or even our commute we can take the time to make time to spend with our family and friends.
Getting beyond isolation is only half the solution. Perhaps most importantly, we need to start considering the well-being of others as integral to our own well being. Being part of a community doesn’t mean just reaping it’s benefits. It means accepting that one of our responsibilities is to consider the well-being of those around us. As individuals, we need to start thinking of ourselves as part of a community, and acting knowing that what we do affects those around us. Our sprawling lifestyle simply means that—like it or not—we’ve enlarged our communities and increased the lives we effect with our actions. Pursue luxury and the American dream, but take ownership of its impacts.
For the not-so-huddled masses of suburbia, there’s still something appealing about the white picket fences, the 2.2 kids, golden retrievers and even the distinguished title of soccer mom. Granted, giving up the SUV may disqualify us for membership in the manly fraternity of Those Who Haul Things, but through interconnectedness and diversity, it will make us better neighbors.
Lance Freeman tackles the issue of gentrification from the perspectives of residents in the gentrified neighborhood. He criticizes the literature for overlooking the experiences of the victims of gentrification. The author argues that people’s conceptions on the issue are somewhat misinformed in that most people consider it as completely deplorable, whereas in reality, it benefits the community by promoting businesses, different types of stores, and cleaner streets. These benefits are even acknowledged by many residents in the gentrified neighborhood. However, the author admits that gentrification indeed does harm. Although gentrification does not equate to displacement per se, it serves to benefit primarily homeowners and harm the poor. Additionally,
Several works we have read thus far have criticized the prosperity of American suburbia. Jack Kerouac's The Dharma Bums, Philip Roth's Goodbye, Columbus, and an excerpt from Lawrence Ferlinghetti's poem "A Coney Island of the Mind" all pass judgement on the denizens of the middle-class and the materialism in which they surround themselves. However, each work does not make the same analysis, as the stories are told from different viewpoints.
Public housing was designed to liberate the city and streets of vagrants and paupers; however, in spite of strong support and investment, in practice it did not achieve that feat. The article The Beginning of the End of a Modern Ghetto by Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh discusses the racial and class stereotypes that obscured the way Chicago's Robert Taylor Homes functioned. When it opened in November 1962, Robert Taylor Homes, were twenty-eight sixteen-story buildings containing 4,300 units on Chicago's South Side, and was considered the world's largest public housing project. This demonstrated how much space and money was invested into this public housing project. The managers of the Chicago Housing Authority at first tried to work with the tenants but were quickly overwhelmed by the task of maintaining the enormous physical plant inhabited by thousands of children. The tenant applicant screening committees of managers and tenants eventually stopped meeting, the population grew steadily poorer, and by the 1970s single mothers on welfare made up the majority of the adult residents. This was the beginning of a failed experiment because after this things only worsened. The young...
Another inequality that African Americans faced in the Consumers’ Republic was during the 1950s and 1960s, when African Americans were discriminated against from accessing housing in suburbia. After the postwar period, suburbia saw a 45 percent increase in growth because American citizens wanted to live the “American Dream” by living in a fancy neighbourhood with white picket fences, cars, and children, demonstrating the status of a middle class citizen (p. 195). White Americans left major metropolitan cities and went to the suburbs because African American veterans were overcrowding these areas after the war. White Americans viewed African Americans as beacons of greater poverty and crime and continued this fear as they moved to the suburbs because they believed that if their neighbourhood became racially intermixed then their property value would fall (p. 213). The first sort of
An aging population, a younger generation who prefer walkable places, economic shifts, and the environmental impacts of suburban development are all contributing factors” (Beatz 141). Reshaping Metropolitan America gives an argument, as well as a blueprint, on how we can transform our infrastructure and housing demands by 2030.
In this article, Squires and Kubrin argue that place, race, and privilege interact and combine to play a large role in the unequal opportunities that different citizens have in metropolitan areas across the United States. They first explain the existence of “bad” neighborhoods in these metropolitan areas and attempt to describe their development over time. They discuss how place has played a role in this. For example, they discuss sprawl, which they define as “a pattern of development associated with outward expansion, low-density housing and commercial development, fragmentation of planning…, auto-dependent transport, and segregated land use patterns” (48). They explain how sprawl has negatively affected inner-city neighborhoods. Additionally, the authors discuss the impact of race on the formation of unequal life opportunities. Racial minorities do not have access to the same opportunities as white people in America today. Although improving in recent years, the United States remains a highly segregation nation. This segregation, which is both a cause for and result of sprawl, is an example of how place and race interact in the formation of bad neighborhoods and unequal opportunities. Finally, the authors define how privilege affects inequality. Living in an area of large concentrated poverty as well as family social status, being born into either extreme wealth or poverty, have a large effect on the opportunities that one will have in life.
Urban sprawl is a widespread concern that impacts land use, transportation, social and economic development, and most importantly our health. Poorly planned development is threatening our health, our environment and our quality of life. Sprawl is blamed for many things such as asthma and global warming, flooding and erosion, extinction of wildlife, and most importantly the public health such as social isolation and obesity due to people driving everywhere. Building offices, homes, shops, schools and other buildings influences the building of roads, transit and other transportation modes. This relationship that can lead to safe, walkable, diverse and lively communities or out of control, poorly planned urban sprawl. Unfortunately sprawl has been winning and the public health is at risk.
We take them for granted when driving miles to the closest mall. We are unconscious of their usefulness when traveling to see a distant relative by car. We can't take a moment to stop and admire their beauty and usefulness; the architectural wonders that are highways and their interchanges; which have such a rich history embedded in the American suburbia of today. Let's go back to the early 1900's, when the automobile was starting to become a dominate part of the American life (Morton, 2014). Around this time; a shift began to occur towards private transportation over public by influencing policies in their favor (Nicolaides and Wiese, 2006). One of these polices was created by the Federal Aid Highway of 1925; the United States Highway System which basically expanded the highways across the United States connecting one another, creating new opportunities for growth in many areas (Weingroff, 1996). This had many effects on different factors of the American way of life; specifically suburbia (Morton, 2014). After the war, the private home that was a luxury a few years prior, was now becoming affordable for many thanks to low interest rates and flexible payments through the National Housing Act of 1934, created by the Federal Housing Administration (Fishman, 1987). Perfect example of a policy acting towards private over public was the Los Angles Master Plan of 1941, which pushed the direction of private automobiles and singles households: there being 1.16 million cars (2.4 people per car) and having 31 percent of the city land dedicated for single family homes, this was really solidifying the post suburbia lifestyle (Fishman, 1987). In Los Angeles alone around this time, 900 square miles were transformed to tract development homes ...
“gentrification as an ugly product of greed. Yet these perspectives miss the point. Gentrification is a byproduct of mankind 's continuing interest in advancing the notion that one group is more superior to another and worthy of capitalistic consumption with little regard to social consciousness. It is elitism of the utmost and exclusionary politics to the core. This has been a constant theme of mankind to take or deplete a space for personal gain. In other words, it 's very similar to the "great advantage" of European powers over Native Americans and westward expansion”(Wharton).
Autism, like cerebral palsy or epilepsy is not a single disease. It is a name given to behavioral phenotype that may have many etiologies. The word autism is derived from a Greek word “autos” which means “self”. Thus autism meant ‘isolated self’. Eugen Bleuler, a Swiss psychiatrist, was the first person to use the word autism. He started using it around 1911 to refer to a group of symptoms of schizophrenia. In 1942 researchers started using the term Autism to describe children with emotional or social problems.
Autism spectrum disorder and Asperger’s syndrome, a higher function branch of autism spectrum disorder, affect many adults in the world. These disorders affect the development of thinking and social skills. Many adults have difficulty leading normal lives due to the effects of autism spectrum disorder and Asperger’s syndrome. They have difficulty in school, at work, and even in the social situations of everyday life. The paper examines how autism spectrum disorder affects adults in fields such as: difficulty with higher education, difficulty with finding and keeping jobs in the labor force, and difficulty with social situations. The paper will be concluded with how society views autism spectrum disorder and what it believes should be done.
To be more specific, this disorder is referred to as Autism or ASD, Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Autism is a form of neurodevelopment disorder in the autism spectrum disorders. It is characterized by impaired development in social interactions and communication, both verbal and non-verbal. There is an observed lack of spontaneous acts of communication; both receptive and expressed, as well as speech impairments. A person diagnosed with Autism will also show a limited range of activities and interests, as well as forming and maintain peer relationships. The individuals will display limited interests, which are often very focused and repetitive. He or she is likely to be very routine oriented and may show behavioral symptoms such as hyperactivity, impulsivity, aggressiveness, and self-injurious behaviors.
Harvey, Todd, and et al. Gentrification and West Oakland: Causes, Effects, and Best Practices 1999. 22 Nov. 2003.
The essay; ”Living with strangers,” written by Siri Hustvedt deals with the attitude of urban living in New York City. There are many different rules of living between the country side and the city and there exist many unspoken rules in all cultures and societies. Siri Hustvedt tells us that she grew up in the country side rural Minnesota were it was a custom to greet everyone you met or else you could be accused of the worst possible sin, snobbery. Then she moved to New York City in 1978. Here she discovered how unpractical it would be to greet every person she met. Siri quickly learnt the simple survival law of the New Yorkers: Pretend it isn’t happening. The title “Living with strangers” refers to the paradox that we are becoming more isolated while being surrounded by increasingly more people.