This course provides an interdisciplinary view of American urban history from the colonial era to the present. Using a variety of historical, literary, and visual materials, it traces the development of the city as physical environment, social experience, political entity, and cultural symbol. The topics will include the colonial town, the walking city, the skyline, the suburb, the ghetto, the urban crisis, the Sunbelt, the metropolitan region, and the gentrification process. Readings will be supplemented with slide-lectures and several recent films.

Students are required to take a mid-term and final exam as well as to write a paper of 10-15 pages in length. The paper may concern the topics listed in the course syllabus or may be devised by the student in consultation with the instructor.

Addams, Jane

Twenty Years at Hull House (New York: Signet, 1981)

Jackson, Kenneth T.

Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985)

Jacobs, Jane.

The Death and Life of Great American Cities (New York: Vintage, 1963)

Mohl, Raymond A., ed.

The Making of Urban America (Wilmington, Del.: Scholarly Resources, 1987)

Osofsky, Gilbert

Harlem,: The Making of a Ghetto (New York: Harper & Row, 1971)

Peterson, Paul E., ed.

The New Urban Reality (Washington, D.C.: The Brookings Institution, 1985)

Pynchon, Thomas

The Crying of Lot 49 (New York: Bantam, 1982)

INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF THE CITY - AUGUST 31

I. HISTORICAL ANTECEDENTS OF THE MODERN METROPOLIS: COLONIAL TOWNS AND CITIES - SEPTEMBER 4

• Required: Mohl, ed.:
  The Making of Urban America, pp. 3-11, 12-23 and 24-44 (Introduction, Goldfield, and Nash)

II. URBANIZATION AND IMMIGRATION IN THE AGE OF CAPITAL - SEPTEMBER 7

• Required: Mohl, ed.:
  The Making of Urban America, pp. 71-80, 157-69, 170-18 (Introduction, Vecoli, and Bodnar, Weber, and Simon)

III. THE SUBURBAN IDEAL IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY AMERICA - SEPTEMBER 11

• Required: Jackson:
  Crabgrass Frontier, pp. 20-102

IV. BIRTH OF THE SKYSCRAPER - SEPTEMBER 18

• Required: Mona Domosh:
  "The Symbolism of the Skyscraper: Case Studies of New York's First Tall Buildings," Journal of Urban History 14 (May 1988): 321 -345 [Handout]
• Slide-lecture on the Chicago and New York skylines

V. CITY LIFE AND SOCIAL REFORM: PROGRESSIVES - SEPTEMBER 25, 28

• Required: Addams:
  Twenty Years at Hull House pp. 1-197 and 198-310
• Film:
  America & Lewis Hine Nina Rosenblum (1984), The Cinema Guild

VI. DEVELOPMENT OF THE GHETTO - OCTOBER 2, 5

• Required: Osofsky:
  Harlem: The Making of a Ghetto

VII. METROPOLITAN GROWTH IN THE LATE NINETEENTH AND EARLY TWENTIETH CENTURIES - OCTOBER 12

• Required: Jackson
  Crabgrass Frontier, pp. 103-189

VIII. URBANIZATION AND SUBURBANIZATION BETWEEN THE WORLD WARS - OCTOBER 16 19

• Required: Jackson:
  Crabgrass Frontier, pp. 190-230
• Mohl, ed.:
  The Making of Urban America, 189-201, 202-213, 214-227, 228-251, and 252-267 (Introduction, Lotchin, Mohl, Jackson, and Luckingham)
• Film:
  World of Tomorrow, Tom Johnson and Lance Bird ( 1986), Media Study Inc., 83 minutes
• MID-TERM EXAMINATION - OCTOBER 23

IX. URBAN DECLINE, SUBURBAN RENAISSANCE - OCTOBER 26 - 30

• Required: Jackson:
  Crabgrass Frontier, pp. 231 -282;
• Leonard Wallock:
  "New York City: Capital of the Twentieth Century," in New York: Culture Capital of the World 1940-1965, ed. Leonard Wallock (New York: Rizzoli, 1988), pp . 17-50 [Handout]
• Slide-lecture on Robert Moses and New York, 1940s-1960s

X. CITIES IN CRISIS: URBAN RENEWAL IN THE 1950's - NOVEMBER 2, 6

• Required: Jacobs:
  The Death and Life of Great American Cities, pp. 3-142
• Film:
  Mission Hill and the Miracle of Boston Richard Broadman ( 1978), Cine Research, 60 minutes

XI. CITIES IN CRISIS: COMMUNITY ORGANIZING IN THE 1960's - NOVEMBER 9, 13

• Required: Jacobs:
  The Death and Life of Great American Cities, pp. 372-91, 428-48
• Film:
  Metropolitan Avenue, Christine Noschese (1985), New Day Films, 60 minutes

XII. SOCIAL PROBLEMS OF THE CITY AND SUBURBS: GHETTOIZATION IN THE 1970's AND 1980's - NOVEMBER 16, 20

• Required: Peterson, ed.:
  The New Urban Reality, pp. 33-68, 129-193 (Kasarda, Wilson, and Orfield)

XIII. THE "REVITALIZATION" OF CITIES: GENTRIFICATION AND HOMELESSNESS IN THE 1 980S - NOVEMBER 27

• Required: Peterson, ed.:
  The New Urban Reality, pp. 69-96 (Berry)
• William Sharpe and Leonard Wallock:
  "Tales of Two Cities: Gentrification and Displacement in Contemporary New York," in Begetting Images: Studies in the Art and Science of Symbol Production, ed. Mary B. Campbell and Mark Rollins (New York: Peter Lang, 1989), pp . 169- 199 [Handout]

XIV. VISIONS OF THE MODERN CITY - NOVEMBER 30, DECEMBER 4

• Required: Thomas Pynchon
  The Crying of Lot 49, pp. 1-57 and 58-138
• Steven Marcus
  "Reading the Illegible: Some Modern Representations of Urban Experience," in Visions of the Modern City: Essays in History, Art and Literature, ed. William Sharpe and Leonard Wallock (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987), pp . 232-256 [Handout]
• Slide-lecture on artistic images of the modern city

XV. THE FUTURE OF THE AMERICAN METROPOLIS - DECEMBER 7, 11

• Required: Peterson, ed.
  The New Urban Reality, pp. 281-295 (Downs),
• Mohl, ed.:
  The Making of Urban America, pp. 277-289 (Conzen)
• Jackson
  Crabgrass Frontier, pp. 283-305

XVI. FINAL EXAMINATION (DATE TO BE ANNOUNCED)