A Review of Cities of People, Not for Profit!
- Reviewers: Benjamin Mørch
- Link: http://citiesforppl.org/
Data and Sources
The project consists of text, images, videos, sound, documents of transcripts of interviews, and additional information about each interview like the length, resource type, format, etc.
Processes
The site is segmented into different oral history stories accompanied by a picture and a quote from the person. Each video and sound recording is not edited further than the start of the recording until the end.
Presentation
The project is in its own words “an oral history project tracing the history of ongoing gentrification and subsequent fight for affordable housing in Bushwick, Brooklyn from the perspective of artists, activists, and community residents.” It consists of the main site with photos of different people related to the project, together with a quote and a small description. Each of these photos is linked to different interviews made with the participants either as video or audio. From the main site, you can pick and navigate to interviews, a timeline bibliography, about an activist toolkit. It is built using HTML and the video pieces are linked to a profile on Vimeo (https://vimeo.com/cities4ppl) and the audio pieces are linked to a SoundCloud profile (https://soundcloud.com/antievictionmap) as part of a bigger audio recording project called “The Anti-Eviction Mapping Project”. A project that works on documenting the dispossession and resistance of Bay Area, Los Angeles, and New York residents to gentrifying landscapes.
Digital Tools Used to Build It
Mainly HTML with embedded video and sound recordings. Additional TimlineJS is used to create an interactive timeline over the history of Bushwick. TimlineJS is an open-source program.
Languages
The main text and communication are in English but some of the interviews are in Spanish
Review
The full name of the project is Cities for People, Not for Profit: Gentrification and Housing Activism in Bushwick, NY. From the about page you get the impression that it is mostly driven and created by Cynthia Tobar herself. She is an artist, activist-scholar and oral historian. She has studied English, politics, information, and library science across different institutions. She is a first-generation Ecuadorian American and was born in Queens. At the moment she lives in Bushwick, Brooklyn, and works as an assistant professor, Head of Archives at Bronx Community College. She has incorporated an acknowledgments section to her site, where she thanks the community in Bushwick and especially the art and activist community. Apart from that, the project is financially supported by a grant from The City University of New York PSC-CUNY Research Award Program. The funding supports different kinds of activities in the creative arts and research in natural science, social science, and humanities, including research related to curriculum development and teaching. The funding is possible though that fund is limited, which probably means that the project is also based on volunteer work and help from friends and networks. Also, possibly a reason why she chose to include acknowledgments as many people in her network has been helpful to create the project.
The project is very clear about the purpose on the about page, as it quotes Henri Lefebvre, the citizen's right to the city. As in the title it wishes to respond to gentrification, rampant real estate growth, and housing policy. The means to achieve this goal is by oral history stories and resources to help the community respond to gentrification with alternative housing strategies, locating activist organizations, and fair housing efforts in the area. As they put it on the site: “Ultimately, we want to seek effective ways to empower urban residents to contribute to greater urban democracy, using these stories to underscore the urgent need for politics in this city to prioritize housing that corresponds to the human social needs of the people of this city rather than to the capitalist profit-driven economy of the elite few.“ The stories are the main part of the site and the first thing you encounter with a quote and photos in black and white. When your cursor is on top of a photo a small summary of the interview pops up. That gives a good sense of what each interview is about and is easier to navigate since there is no search function or categories, so at first glance, it is difficult to find out where to start. The interviews themselves are not edited even though they touch upon different topics during it. That makes them less accessible since listening to them all would be very time-consuming. In that way, the site does not create much engagement in the project unless you have a good time to spend on it.
For the goal of engaging people to respond to gentrification in their own neighborhoods, the different kinds of oral history recordings show a range of different personalities and people. It gives a way for people to potentially be able to mirror themselves in the participants. There are residents of the area, NGO staff, elderly people, younger people, artists, and activists but this part could still be broadened. You could argue that many more stories could be recorded, but the project is still ongoing so it is possible more will come in the future.
An important part of the project from their own description is to give tools to other activists. Unfortunately, the project site is missing a bit on the activist toolkit since there are only a few links to other projects where some of them just lead to a dead end. If you wish to engage in your own community, they do link to a number of different organizations where more information can be found.