Description
Richly illustrated with more than ninety historical and contemporary images, historical maps, and maps drawn especially for the book, Revolting New York provides the first comprehensive account of the historical geography of revolt in New York, from the earliest uprisings of the Munsee against the Dutch occupation of Manhattan in the seventeenth century to the Black Lives Matter movement and the unrest of the Trump era. Through this rich narrative, editors Neil Smith and Don Mitchell reveal a continuous, if varied and punctuated, history of rebellion in New York that is as vital as the more standard histories of formal politics, planning, economic growth, and restructuring that largely define our consciousness of New York's story.
About the Author
Neil Smith (1954-2012) was Distinguished Professor of Geography and Anthropology at the Graduate Center at the City University of New York and the author of many books, including Uneven Development: Nature, Capital, and the Production of Space (Georgia).
Don Mitchell is Distinguished Professor of Geography Emeritus at Syracuse University and Professor of Cultural Geography at Uppsala University in Sweden. He is the author of several books, including They Saved the Crops: Labor, Landscape, and the Struggle over Industrial Farming in Bracero-Era California (Georgia). He was a MacArthur Fellow in 1998.
Reviews
Like a woke dog zapped by an invisible electric barrier whenever it tries to leave the yard, I now recognize the real reason I can't escape this place. Revolting New York is an electrifying compendium of tales of four centuries of the energetic insubordination that is so completely foundational to our character. While the causes and constituencies have varied all over our map, the constant has been taking to the streets, fomenting an unending festival of resistance. I couldn't be prouder than to discover that my homes downtown have been at uprising's very epicenter. You can't scare me; I'm sticking to the Union Square!"- Michael Sorkin, author of What Goes Up: The Rights and Wrongs of the City
"Revolting New York takes you on a whirlwind tour of Indian wars, riots, slave revolts, strikes, protests, and police rampages, from Dutch New Amsterdam to Occupy Wall Street. The sheer number and ferocity of past disorders, and the strangeness of so many of them, will leave you seeing the history of New York as you never did before."- Joshua B. Freeman, author of Working-Class New York: Life and Labor Since World War II
"Urban unrest, observed Alain Locke after the Harlem Riots of 1935, is like 'a revealing flash of lightning' that illuminates larger dynamics. Using this insight as premise and guide, Revolting New York reveals how the entire social history of the city can be narrated through those frequent moments, over the past four centuries, when the tensions of urban life, and the violence of inequality, have boiled over in its streets. This volume's creators, led by two of our foremost urban geographers, show that you can't understand social change or urban history without examining the 'flashpoints' through which the city is fought for-and sometimes even won-by people desirous of a life here that's not revolting at all."- Joshua Jelly-Schapiro, coeditor of Nonstop Metropolis: A New York City Atlas
Book Information
ISBN 9780820352824
Author Neil Smith
Format Paperback
Page Count 362
Imprint University of Georgia Press
Publisher University of Georgia Press
Weight(grams) 920g