Thursday, July 28, 2011
Gentrification - Good or Bad?
This Washington Post Article on gentrification in Anacostia has got me thinking about how we talk about the less fortunate and the neighborhoods they live in.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Friday, July 22, 2011
Anacostia Continued...
More pics of the Frederick Douglass house. What do you guys think of the sign that Randelle's standing next to?
Anacostia Continued...Frederick Douglass House | Museum
These are pictures from the Frederick Douglass Museum.
Anacostia Continued...
Inspirational Mural we saw on Good Hope.- Row of either remolded or boarded up homes.
- Look at the clouds! Absolutely beautiful! Just more neighborhood pics as well, notice the little "Cho's" market. Referring back to our talk about "Black owned" or "Korean owned" businesses.
- Also, graffiti that graces the neighborhoods, but surprisingly, not completely all over the place!
Anacostia
- It's not the greatest picture of the library, but look at the clouds in the background!
- Also, a random neighborhood picture, all too familiar as we passed several blocks.
- The recycled materials and the mini Panton chairs in the library!
- Also, more boarded up buildings, it could be something so pretty too!
Anacostia
Hi Everyone,
Another great field trip to the Anacostia area, starting with the library. Upon arriving at the library, I was pleasantly surprised--to say the least. First, how great is it that the brand new library is [I think] a Green building? Although I'm not sure if it's LEED certified or not, it clearly looked "green" to me just from the materials alone. The structure itself is open and airy--and a great contribution to Anacostia. Besides the architecture and the building itself, I noticed mini designer Panton chairs in the children's section [THAT made me really, really happy] as well as the use of recycled paper throughout the book shelves and columns; numerous computer stations and although we didn't go upstairs, I did some further research to find that it IS two stories!
Anacostia to me, was really sad. It was desolate for a Saturday afternoon. We hardly saw people--and when we did, it was either at the laundry mat, the nearby convenience store or the patrons we saw in the library. Restaurants comprised of merely take-out or "to-go" places because I clearly DID NOT see any dining room tables or chairs in any of them. But that's just the jist of my experience there. As we walked around the neighborhoods on our way to the Frederick Douglass Museum, it wasn't uncommon to see fixed up homes amongst boarded up and vacant properties. It seemed as though I was in some small random town in the middle of Arizona, having people look at us as if we're foreigners or that we simply "don't belong". But regardless of how the town "looked" or how lost we looked--when we clearly weren't, I didn't feel threatened or uncomfortable. I was merely disappointed in the desolate nature of Anacostia, it felt just so lonely and abandoned.
Anacostia is like one of those places that you would say WTF?! [Excuse my acronym's French nature :) ]. At times like these, it really made me want to turn this WTF into FTW [for the win] moments. Sorry, that may be mildly as annoying as the lemonade out of lemons phrase. Although there's still a sense of idealism in me, it is without a doubt that I thought for some time that there's something we can do. The library was a great step for a greater community, but how could it be possible that Anacostia seems like an old ghost town even if we're only over the river? Literally ten minutes away from the District itself? What can I do? How can we make Anacostia a safer, cleaner and more desirable place to raise children? What can we do to beautify this community and make it a more popular place to live?
It was Nelson Mandela's 93rd birthday this week and although he says a great deal that always sticks to me, I thought of this [when thinking about Anacostia]: "As we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give others permission to do the same".
Hope you guys enjoy the pics. I especially love the picturesque clouds in the sky. Such a beautiful day in the neighborhood :)
Have a wonderful Friday and I'll see you guys tomorrow!
xo K
Another great field trip to the Anacostia area, starting with the library. Upon arriving at the library, I was pleasantly surprised--to say the least. First, how great is it that the brand new library is [I think] a Green building? Although I'm not sure if it's LEED certified or not, it clearly looked "green" to me just from the materials alone. The structure itself is open and airy--and a great contribution to Anacostia. Besides the architecture and the building itself, I noticed mini designer Panton chairs in the children's section [THAT made me really, really happy] as well as the use of recycled paper throughout the book shelves and columns; numerous computer stations and although we didn't go upstairs, I did some further research to find that it IS two stories!
Anacostia to me, was really sad. It was desolate for a Saturday afternoon. We hardly saw people--and when we did, it was either at the laundry mat, the nearby convenience store or the patrons we saw in the library. Restaurants comprised of merely take-out or "to-go" places because I clearly DID NOT see any dining room tables or chairs in any of them. But that's just the jist of my experience there. As we walked around the neighborhoods on our way to the Frederick Douglass Museum, it wasn't uncommon to see fixed up homes amongst boarded up and vacant properties. It seemed as though I was in some small random town in the middle of Arizona, having people look at us as if we're foreigners or that we simply "don't belong". But regardless of how the town "looked" or how lost we looked--when we clearly weren't, I didn't feel threatened or uncomfortable. I was merely disappointed in the desolate nature of Anacostia, it felt just so lonely and abandoned.
Anacostia is like one of those places that you would say WTF?! [Excuse my acronym's French nature :) ]. At times like these, it really made me want to turn this WTF into FTW [for the win] moments. Sorry, that may be mildly as annoying as the lemonade out of lemons phrase. Although there's still a sense of idealism in me, it is without a doubt that I thought for some time that there's something we can do. The library was a great step for a greater community, but how could it be possible that Anacostia seems like an old ghost town even if we're only over the river? Literally ten minutes away from the District itself? What can I do? How can we make Anacostia a safer, cleaner and more desirable place to raise children? What can we do to beautify this community and make it a more popular place to live?
It was Nelson Mandela's 93rd birthday this week and although he says a great deal that always sticks to me, I thought of this [when thinking about Anacostia]: "As we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give others permission to do the same".
Hope you guys enjoy the pics. I especially love the picturesque clouds in the sky. Such a beautiful day in the neighborhood :)
Have a wonderful Friday and I'll see you guys tomorrow!
xo K
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
DC Housing Prices
I was watching the news the other day and it's official: the Washington Metro region is the highest performing real estate market in the country. Considering we just toured the U-Street area, it had me wondering: who's really buying these houses? Do we care if current residents are being priced out and forced to move? I think about the fact that the unemployment rate for blacks is 16% in the area compared to whites at 8%, how will U-Street or any other neighborhood going through renewal look like in the next 5 to 10 years?
Monday, July 11, 2011
Pics Continued...
These are the rest of the pics, ending at Ben's Next Door and cooling off with some drinks! The pic of the child with the aviator hat, was a pic that we were sitting next to at Ben's. I just thought that it was a great photo of all these African American children--and the one that stood out was the one with the hat because it immediately reminded me of the Tuskegee Airmen.
Saturday Afternoon Ventures
Hi Everyone,
I had a great time walking around the U Street Corridor on Saturday [thanks Dr. P!]! As you know, we walked around most of the corridor and in the end, Jaya, Randelle and I ended up at Ben's Next Door for a few drinks, bites and a good time!
While walking around, I had forgotten how busy it was on a Saturday and how much, just in the last two years, U Street has changed. It seems a great deal livelier, a little more active and has a host of more little restaurants. Although I'm very familiar with the area, I did notice a lot of little places that I didn't notice before [think of that soul food restaurant that was HAPPENIN', that we MUST try] and the diversity of the neighborhood has definitely grown. Two years ago, I noticed U Street had a heavy Latino population. Now, as we look around, I noticed a great deal of "hipsters" and random cute little shops. This area is definitely reminding me of Silverlake in Los Angeles, where locals can really tell the significant differences through gentrification.
Below are some pics I took on our little tour. Enjoy!
Sunday, July 10, 2011
U Street Corridor
Hello everyone,
This is my first time EVER posting on a blog. Whoohoo! Anyway, I'd like to share with you a couple of my impressions on the U Street Corridor.
Exiting the Center, I noticed there was a fair amount of foot traffic. People, African American and Caucasian alike, were walking about and seemed to be enjoying the neighborhood. However, as we came to the end of the block where the furniture store was located, I immediately noticed that African Americans were no where in sight. It was as if we had reached the place where an invisible boundary separated the African American and Caucasian population of that neighborhood.
The other thing that made a big impression on me was the African American War Memorial. The site is lovely and it encourages contemplation. That was my initial impression. My second impression of it was how much the style of it reminded me of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall, located at the National Mall, but that's where the similarity ended, because I soon found myself wondering why the memorial was designed as is. For example, Why are the plates on which the names are inscribed so small? Why isn't this memorial grander like the memorials that we see at the National Mall? Did the residents of the U Street Corridor have a voice in the design of the memorial, or was it simply imposed on them? Given my personal nature, I would like to believe that the African American War Memorial is pleasing to everyone in the neighborhood. However, due to some of our class discussions, now I'm not so sure what to think of the memorial...
Margaret
Friday, June 10, 2011
WELCOME TO THE DC URBAN LAB BLOG!
THE DC URBAN LAB BLOG is a vehicle for the students and professor of the DC Urban Laboratory Summer 2011 course to record their reflections, photos, analysis, links, and other materials as an ongoing reflective record of their exploration of Washington, DC. This course is offered by the Liberal Studies Program of Georgetown University and taught by Dr. Joseph Palacios.
The texts for the course are:
GILLETTE: Howard Gillette, Jr., Between Justice & Beauty: Race, Planning, and the Failure of Urban Policy in Washington, D.C. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006 edition).
MODAN: Gabriella Gahlia Modan, Turf Wars: Discourse, Diversity, and the Politics of Place (New York: Blackwell Publishing, 2008.
YOUNG: Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000).
The first two weeks of this eight week intensive seminar have addressed the following:
PART ONE: General Theory, Urban Studies and Civic Engagement through Community-Based Learning and Research
Week 1 (June 4): Overview of the Course; Logistics; Presentation of Community-Based Learning Principles and Methods
BLACKBOARD: C. Wright Mills, The Sociological Imagination, Chapter 1
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)