At once poetic and provocative, Victor Burgin's Some Cities deftly juxtaposes photographs and texts in a manner that invites comparisons to the urban essays of filmmaker Chris Marker and cultural critic Walter Benjamin. Best known for his artistic...

This book is a major survey of urbanization and the making of modern Europe from the mid-eighteenth century to the First World War. During these years Europe experienced startling rates of urbanization, with the populations of numerous cities growing by...

Reader reveals how cities came to be, what made them thrive, how they declined, and how they remade themselves. He debunks long-held theories and shows that the first cities actually preceded and inspired the growth of farming, that trees grow better in...

Maintains that the historical roots of modern feminism are found in the complex responses to the social change that accompanied the urbanization and industrialization of America in the early nineteenth century

A reflection on the past and present of city life, and a bold proposal for its future“Constantly stimulating ideas from a veteran of urban thinking.”—Jonathan Meades, The GuardianIn this sweeping work, the preeminent sociologist Richard Sennett traces...

"The mighty Mississippi" has inspired writers and artists for centuries. During the nineteenth century, Mississippi River towns attracted artists who traveled throughout the United States producing detailed drawings of cities and towns, which were then...

Cooperatives have been central to the development of New Orleans. Anne Gessler asserts that local cooperatives have reshaped its built environment by changing where people interact and with whom, helping them collapse social hierarchies and envision new...

Nowhere on Earth is the challenge for ecological understanding greater, and yet more urgent, than in those parts of the globe where human activity is most intense - cities. People need to understand how cities work as ecological systems so they can take...

The author traces the gradual progression of Mayfair from an attractive village to the center of fashion and elegance.

Ranging from village planning in the primitive world to the most intricate urban planning proposals of our day, this new series explores the major epochs and areas in the history of cities and the ordering of man's environment. Each volume, copiously...

In Black Corona, Steven Gregory examines political culture and activism in an African-American neighborhood in New York City. Using historical and ethnographic research, he challenges the view that black urban communities are "socially disorganized."...

As early as the 1850s, gaslight tempted New Yorkers out into a burgeoning nightlife filled with shopping, dining, and dancing. Electricity later turned the city at night into an even more stunning spectacle of brilliantly lit streets and glittering...

Once America's "arsenal of democracy," Detroit over the last fifty years has become the symbol of the American urban crisis. In this reappraisal of racial and economic inequality in modern America, Thomas Sugrue explains how Detroit and many other once...

As the birthplace of the Black Panthers and a nationwide tax revolt, California embodied a crucial motif of the postwar United States: the rise of suburbs and the decline of cities, a process in which black and white histories inextricably joined...

“A cacophonous poem of democracy and greed, like the streets of New York themselves.” ―John Vernon, Los Angeles Times Book ReviewLucy Sante's Low Life is a portrait of America's greatest city, the riotous and anarchic breeding ground of modernity. This...