Description
Book SynopsisThe Everyday Life of Urban Inequality explores steadily increasing inequality and the spectacular pace of urbanization frame everyday life for city residents around the world. With case studies from five continents, this volume explores what it means to live within cities marked by entrenched inequalities, situating daily life at the intersection between global processes and local histories. Drawing from ethnographic research, scholars in varied social science disciplines examine the reproduction of poverty and stratification, the creation of political and social marginality, and the destruction—and resilience—of communities. Authors highlight how inequalities are experienced concretely and within daily life. The treatment of caddies at an elite golf course in Mexico City, the early morning routines of a woman running a food stall in Kuala Lumpur, the debates over voting in Cape Town’s periphery, the frustration of resettled residents with state policies in Casablanca, or the struggles of migrants to locate secure housing in Santiago all offer insights into the many ways in which inequalities are produced. In each chapter, everyday life is presented in vivid detail, noting the power of tradition, the tools of memory, and the impact of belonging as individuals and communities interact with centralized processes of policy and capital. By focusing on situated experiences of displacement, belonging, and difference, this volume demonstrates the power of multi-disciplinary ethnographic research to illustrate the many ways urban inequalities take shape, combine, and are perpetuated.
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
List of Figures
Introduction
Megan Sheehan and Angela D. Storey
Section 1: Development and Displacement
Chapter 1: Losing or Gaining Home? Experiences of Resettlement from Casablanca’s Slums
Raffael Beier and Cristiana Strava
Chapter 2: Kuala Lumpur: World Class City Formation and Urban (In)Equities
Seng-Guan Yeoh
Chapter 3: Full of My Love: Notoriously Dangerous Informal Mass Transit in Maputo
Joel Christian Reed
Section 2: Belonging and Contestation
Chapter 4: Part and Parcel of Urbanization: Contested Claims to Land Access and Urban Indigenous Spaces in Hermosillo
Lucero Radonic
Chapter 5: Traditions of the Oppressed: Popular Aesthetics and Layered Barrio Space Against the Erasure of Gentrification in Austin
Ben Chappell
Chapter 6: They Always Promise Toilets: Electoral Politics and Infrastructural Inequality in Post-Apartheid Cape Town
Angela D. Storey
Section 3: Difference and Proximity
Chapter 7: Spaces of Migration and the Production of Inequalities in Santiago, Chile
Megan Sheehan
Chapter 8: Privilege and Space: An Analysis of Spatial Relations and Social Inequality in Mexico City Through the Lens of Golf
Hugo Ceron-Anaya
Chapter 9: New Cityscapes: Redesigning Urban Cartographies Through Creative Practices and Critical Pedagogies in London
Chiara Minestrelli
Conclusion: The Power of Breadth and Depth: Urban Ethnography Across Geographies
Angela D. Storey and Jessica Bodoh-Creed
Index
About the Contributors
