Ghetto Lib/E: The Invention of a Place, the History of an Idea

On March 29, 1516, the city council of Venice issued a decree forcing Jews to live in il geto―a closed quarter named for the copper foundry that once occupied the area. The term stuck. In this sweeping and original interpretation, Mitchell Duneier traces the idea of the ghetto from its beginnings in the sixteenth century and its revival by the Nazis to the present. As Duneier shows, we cannot understand the entanglements of race, poverty, and place in America today without recalling the history of the ghetto in Europe, as well as later efforts to understand the problems of the American city. This is the story of the scholars and activists who tried to achieve that understanding. Their efforts to wrestle with race and poverty in their times cannot be divorced from their individual biographies, which often included direct encounters with prejudice and discrimination in the academy and elsewhere. Using new and forgotten sources, Duneier introduces us to Horace Cayton and St. Clair Drake, graduate students whose conception of the South Side of Chicago established a new paradigm for thinking about Northern racism and poverty in the 1940s. We learn how the psychologist Kenneth Clark subsequently linked Harlem's slum conditions with the persistence of black powerlessness in the civil-rights era, and we follow the controversy over Daniel Patrick Moynihan's report on the black family. We see how the sociologist William Julius Wilson redefined the debate about urban America as middle-class African Americans increasingly escaped the ghetto and the country retreated from racially specific remedies. And we trace the education reformer Geoffrey Canada's efforts to transform the lives of inner-city children with ambitious interventions, even as other reformers sought to help families escape their neighborhoods altogether. Ghetto offers a clear-eyed assessment of the thinkers and doers who have shaped American ideas about urban poverty and the ghetto. The result is a valuable new understanding of an age-old concept.

About the Author :
Mitchell Duneier is the Maurice P. During Professor of Sociology at Princeton University and the author of the award-winning urban ethnographies Slim's Table and Sidewalk. Prentice Onayemi began his voice-over career narrating English language learning programs before branching out to narrating audiobooks. In addition to voice-over, Prentice has appeared in theatrical works in NYC ranging from downtown passion projects to Broadway mainstays. He holds a BFA in Drama from NYU and an MBA from Columbia University.

Review :
"[Ghetto] is timely and important." -- "Booklist" "[Duneier's]...rich intellectual history of the ghetto raises important questions about how we might address the plight of its residents." -- "Washington Post" "A badly needed and rich historical analysis...[that] helps us discern the insights and blindnesses of policies that seek to empower poor people." -- "Cornel West, New York Times bestselling author" "A fascinating analysis of the various conceptions of the 'ghetto' throughout history, as well as a look into the many sociological controversies of these areas and structural racism in the United States...A clearly written book for anyone who is interested in the history of racism and its possible solutions." -- "Library Journal (starred review)" "A searing and searching examination of the political and cultural history at the root of this powerfully evocative and inflammatory term." -- "Boston Globe" "A sociologist who has a knack for writing for general audiences...effectively merges scholarship with a journalist's eye for detail...This is accessible historical sociology that deserves a wide readership." -- "Kirkus Reviews" "Brilliant...[Duneier's] concerns are born from profound sociological and historical understanding. His book is an incisive, balanced, yet commendably biting account of the unfinished history of the ghetto." -- "Wall Street Journal" "Duneier resuscitates the 'forgotten ghetto' and the various ways it was understood...[A] far-reaching and incisive study." -- "Publishers Weekly (starred review)" "Prentice Onayemi conveys the information well, ensuring listeners' attention." -- "Audiofile" "Stunningly detailed and timely...In Duneier's impressive and comprehensive volume, readers will find a greater sense of the complexity of America's problem of racial inequality, as well as the urgency―practical and moral―of solving it." -- "New York Times Book Review"