Model City Blues tells the story of how regular people, facing a changing city landscape, fought for their own model of the “ideal city” by creating grassroots plans for urban renewal. Filled with vivid descriptions of significant moments in a protracted struggle, it offers a street-level account of organized resistance to institutional plans to transform New Haven, Connecticut in the 1960s. Anchored in the physical spaces and political struggles of the city, it brings back to center stage the individuals and groups who demanded that their voices be heard. By reexamining the converging class- and race-based movements of 1960s New Haven, Mandi Jackson helps to explain the city's present-day economic and political struggles. More broadly, by closely analyzing particular sites of resistance in New Haven, Model City Blues employs multiple academic disciplines to redefine and reimagine the roles of everyday city spaces in building social movements and creating urban landscapes.

A street-level account of organized resistance to urban renewal in 1960s New Haven that fosters deeper understanding of cities, race, class, and social movements

About the Author
Mandi Isaacs Jackson is a Visiting Assistant Professor in African-American Studies at Wesleyan University where she teaches courses in urban studies.

Reviews
"Model City Blues breaks new ground reassessing New Haven politically through the lens of ethnographic and historic research. Through an urban context, Jackson synthesizes the cultural and economic foundations of past and future social movements. This book is the most impressive culmination of the most significant social and political research on New Haven in at least a generation." -Immanuel Ness, Brooklyn College, City University of New York



Book Information
ISBN 9781592136032
Author Mandi Isaacs Jackson
Format Hardback
Page Count 296
Imprint Temple University Press,U.S.
Publisher Temple University Press,U.S.
Dimensions(mm) 229mm * 152mm * 23mm