A Haven and a Hell: The Ghetto in Black America

The black ghetto is thought of as a place of urban decay and social disarray. Like the historical ghetto of Venice, it is perceived as a space of confinement, one imposed on black America by whites. It is the home of a marginalized underclass and a sign of the depth of American segregation. Yet while black urban neighborhoods have suffered from institutional racism and economic neglect, they have also been places of refuge and community. In A Haven and a Hell, Lance Freeman examines how the ghetto shaped black America and black America shaped the ghetto. Freeman traces the evolving role of predominantly black neighborhoods in northern cities from the late nineteenth century through the present day. At times, the ghetto promised the freedom to build black social institutions and political power. At others, it suppressed and further stigmatized African Americans. Freeman reveals the forces that caused the ghetto's role as haven or hell to wax and wane, spanning the Great Migration, mid-century opportunities, the eruptions of the sixties, the challenges of the seventies and eighties, and present-day issues of mass incarceration, the subprime crisis, and gentrification. Offering timely planning and policy recommendations based in this history, A Haven and a Hell provides a powerful new understanding of urban black communities at a time when the future of many inner-city neighborhoods appears uncertain.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments Introduction 1. The Embryonic Ghetto 2. The Age of the Black Enclave 3. The Federally Sanctioned Ghetto 4. World War II and the Aftermath: The Ghetto Diverges 5. The Ghetto Erupts: The 1960s 6. The Last Decades of the Twentieth Century 7. The Ghetto in the Twenty-First Century Conclusion: How to Have a Haven but No Hell in the Twenty-First Century Notes References Index

About the Author :
Lance Freeman is the Penn Integrates Knowledge Professor of City and Regional Planning and Sociology at the University of Pennsylvania. He was previously a professor in the Urban Planning Program in the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia University. His books include There Goes the ’Hood: Views of Gentrification from the Ground Up (2005).

Review :
[An] informative sociohistorical analysis . . . For readers of urban history and black history, this is an excellent look at the ghetto’s multifaceted place in American history. Immensely valuable. A critical read at a time when gentrification is viewed as threatening the black identity of many urban neighborhoods, this book offers a rich and nuanced history of the ghetto’s role in black American life from the late nineteenth century to the present. Resisting a simple characterization, Freeman shows that while the ghetto has sometimes served as an instrument of subjugation and institutional neglect, it has also offered a refuge that has helped to nurture black culture, institutions, and ideas. Through rigorous sociohistorical analysis, Lance Freeman provides insight into how black ghettos developed and then changed over time, giving readers a good sense of the complicated trajectory of 'the ghetto' in America. A Haven and a Hell is a highly accessible and necessary book for a broader and richer understanding of urban black America. With diligent care, Lance Freeman weighs the hurts and capacities of ghetto life in the United States. In a field grown thick with pronouncement, his steadfast empirical commitment and reasoned analyses correct past misperceptions and open new vistas. In A Haven and a Hell, Lance Freeman seeks to amplify the relationship between 'the ghetto' as a place, policy, and idea and as a black experience, source of resistance, and community. Using multiple places and narratives, this book renders 'the ghetto' as not only multifaceted but also critical to understanding the contemporary conditions of urban black America. Freeman’s rich historical account illustrates how pernicious processes of racial domination and exclusion created predominantly Black neighborhoods in Northern U.S. cities. Yet he also shows how these same processes created the conditions of possibility for autonomous Black social institutions and collective identities. Freeman seamlessly combines statistical and archival data with the voices of Black artists, activists, intellectuals, and business and political leaders across nearly 150 of U.S. history for an account that is at once soaring and surprisingly intimate. For those wholly unfamiliar with the history of the formation of the African-American ghetto, this book is an essential read. Its prosaic style makes it very reader friendly. As such, its biggest draw may be for undergraduate students and others who have little understanding of the historical and social conditions that gave rise to what appear today as blighted urban spaces. Freeman adds necessary perspective to our understanding of the role of the ghetto in American life. An eloquently written and captivating book.