The Right to the City: United States Urban History in the 20th Century (HI2F8-15)
Module Director: Dr. Timo Schrader Email: timo.schrader@warwick.ac.uk Office: Room H306, Third Floor, Humanities Building Office Hours: These will be held online only, so please email me to set up an appointment. |
This Land is Ours protest, photo by Marlis Momber. Source: The People's LES |
America is an urban nation today, yet Americans have long had deeply ambivalent feelings toward the city. This 15 CATS module will explore the historical origins of that ambivalence - and how historians have interpreted it over time - by tracing several overarching themes in American urban history with emphasis on the twentieth century. Topics will include race and class relations, gender and sexual identity, immigration, politics and policy, violence and crime, tourism, and the future of urban America. Discussions will revolve around these broad themes as well as regional distinctions between American cities. Over the course of the semester we will figure out who has a “right to the city.”
Some primary sources and online databases/archives on various topics related to the module:
- Immigration to the United States, 1789-1930
- Library of Congress: Cities and Towns
- Robert Moses and the Modern City [New York urban renewal]
- Invincible Cities [photos from decades of minority communities like Harlem and Camden]
- Urban History Association [various resources on cities, including maps and photographs]
- National Archives: Pictures of American Cities
- HyperCities [various digital exhibitions and mapping projects, lots of recent events]
- NYPD: Historical and Current Research [impressive resource database on policing with a focus on the New York Police Department]
- Punk Flyers
- Punk Rock in America
- A Right to the City [digital exhibit on Washington, D.C.]
- Digital Collections: Black Panthers