The Urban Sociology Reader

Citation

Lin, J., & Mele, C. (Eds.). (2012). The Urban Sociology Reader (2nd ed.). Routledge.

Chapter Summary

This is an edited collection, not a single-author text. The second edition brings together forty-three writings in seven parts, from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century, in the Routledge Urban Reader Series. Routledge says that editorial commentaries precede each selection, introducing the text, showing its significance and outlining the issues around its topic, and that an associated bibliography supports further reading. Selections are predominantly sociological but some cross disciplinary boundaries. The parts and selections below follow the publisher's contents list; each selection is listed by author, and its title is given in short form.

Part 1: Urbanization and Community (selections 1–7)

The opening part sets out the classic questions about what city life does to community and personality: Ferdinand Tönnies on community and society, Georg Simmel on the metropolis and mental life, Louis Wirth on urbanism as a way of life, and Claude Fischer on theories of urbanism. It then moves to neighbourhood and network: Jane Jacobs on the uses of city neighbourhoods, Barry Wellman on networks, neighbourhoods and communities, and Robert Putnam on declining social capital ("Bowling Alone").

Part 2: Understanding Urban Growth in the Capitalist City (selections 8–16)

Robert Park on human ecology and Ernest Burgess on the growth of the city represent the ecological tradition; David Harvey (the urban process under capitalism) and John Logan and Harvey Molotch (the city as a growth machine) represent the political economy tradition. Gregory Squires writes on the private city, Michael Dear on Los Angeles and the Chicago School, Neil Brenner and Nik Theodore on "actually existing neoliberalism," Peter Dreier, John Mollenkopf and Todd Swanstrom on metropolitics, and William Rees and Mathis Wackernagel on urban ecological footprints and sustainability.

Part 3: Racial and Social Inequality (selections 17–23)

W. E. B. Du Bois (The Philadelphia Negro), Loïc Wacquant and William Julius Wilson (the cost of racial and class exclusion in the inner city), and Douglas Massey and Nancy Denton (segregation and the making of the underclass) address segregation and the inner city. Further selections cover the immigrant enclave (Alejandro Portes and Robert Manning), the Chinese ethnoburb of Los Angeles (Jan Lin and Paul Robinson), tramps' use of urban space (James Duncan), and race, class and Hurricane Katrina (James Elliott and Jeremy Pais).

Part 4: Gender and Sexuality (selections 24–28)

Ann Markusen on women's household work and urban spatial structure, Melissa Gilbert on working poor women's survival strategies, Sy Adler and Johanna Brenner on lesbians and gay men in the city, Donald Donham on male-male sexuality in Soweto, and Sirpa Tani on a street prostitution area in Helsinki.

Part 5: Globalization and Transnationality (selections 29–33)

John Friedmann on the world city hypothesis, Saskia Sassen on new claims on the global city, Brenda Yeoh and T. C. Chang on Singapore, Paul Stoller and Jasmin McConatha on West African communities in New York, and Peggy Levitt on social remittances.

Part 6: Culture and the City (selections 34–37)

Sharon Zukin asks whose culture and whose city; Richard Florida writes on cities and the creative class; Edward LiPuma and Thomas Koelble on Miami as an urban imaginary; Karin Aguilar-San Juan on Vietnamese communities in Orange County and Boston.

Part 7: Regulation and Rights in Urban Space (selections 38–43)

S. E. Merry on spatial governmentality and gender violence, Setha Low on the erosion of public space, Teresa Caldeira on fortified enclaves, Christopher Mele (one of the editors) on casinos, prisons, incinerators and neoliberal development, James Holston on insurgent citizenship, and David Harvey on the right to the city.

Key Concepts

Part 1: Urbanization and Community

• Community and society; mental life of the metropolis; urbanism as a way of life: the foundational contrasts between small-scale and urban social life.
• Social capital: the theme of Putnam's selection.

Part 2: Understanding Urban Growth in the Capitalist City

• Human ecology and growth of the city: the ecological tradition.
• Growth machine; urban process under capitalism; neoliberalism: political economy perspectives.
• Ecological footprint: urban sustainability.

Parts 3–4: Inequality, Gender and Sexuality

• Segregation and the underclass; immigrant enclave and ethnoburb.
• Gender and space: women's work, sexuality and urban space.

Parts 5–7: Global, Cultural and Regulated City

• World city hypothesis; social remittances; creative class.
• Spatial governmentality; public space; fortified enclaves; insurgent citizenship; right to the city.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• A primary-source map of the field. The contents list gathers the founding texts (Tönnies, Simmel, Wirth, Park, Burgess, Du Bois) with later work (Harvey, Sassen, Zukin, Wacquant and Wilson), so students can read the authors that textbooks summarise.
• Thematic breadth. Seven parts cover community, urban growth, racial and social inequality, gender and sexuality, globalization, culture, and regulation and rights, with cases from Singapore, Helsinki, Soweto, Los Angeles and elsewhere.
• Editorial scaffolding. Commentaries introduce each selection and place it in its context, and a bibliography supports further reading.
• Updated for the second edition. The publisher says the new edition addresses sprawl, sustainability, immigration and urban protest.

Limitations

• A collection, not a continuous account. Selections are chosen by the editors and speak to each other only through the commentaries. A reader who wants one connected argument should pair it with a textbook.
• Uneven demands. The selections span two centuries and several disciplines, so style, vocabulary and assumed background differ from one reading to the next.
• Dated in places. Published in 2012, the collection does not include later work.

Where It Fits in the Course

Among the urban sociology books on this site, the Reader is the anthology of original sources. Gottdiener, Hohle and King's The New Urban Sociology is the full textbook that organises the field around the sociospatial perspective, and Parker's Urban Theory and the Urban Experience is a student introduction to the main traditions of urban theory. Either works well as a companion: the textbook gives the map, and the Reader supplies the authors.

Some of the Reader's authors also appear as books in this course. Jane Jacobs is represented in Part 1 by a selection, and The Death and Life of Great American Cities is her full work. Saskia Sassen appears in Part 5, and The Global City is her book-length study. Robert Sampson's Great American City is a modern neighbourhood-effects study that connects to Parts 1 and 3.

How to Use This Book

The Reader suits undergraduates who have taken an introductory sociology course and want to read the original sources; no urban studies coursework is required.

• Core: one or two selections from each of Parts 1 and 2 (for example Simmel, Wirth, Park and Burgess, then Harvey or Logan and Molotch), since later parts argue with them.
• By course theme: Part 3 for race and inequality, Part 4 for gender and sexuality, Part 5 for globalization, Part 7 for public space and rights.
• Practice: read each selection together with its editorial commentary, then write a short note on how it answers the questions raised by the previous one. Compare David Harvey's two selections, the framework in Part 2 and "The Right to the City" in Part 7, to see how one author's argument about control of urban space develops.