Punk and Gentrification

The History of Punk recently examined the history and ongoing consequences of gentrification. Part one traced the origins of gentrification, its subsequent history, and its ongoing effects. A case study of New York City’s ABC No Rio serves as an example of resistance to gentrification, despite the removal of its physical space in 2016.

Here’s the reading list:
– Dawson Barrett. “The Direct Action Politics of U.S. Punk Collectives”. American Studies, Vol. 52, No. 2 (2013), pp-23-42.
– Ruth Glass. London: Aspects of Change. London: MacGibbon & Kee, 1964.
– Jane Jacobs. The Death and Life of Great American – -Cities. New York City: Random House, 1961.
– Neil Smith. The New Urban Frontier: Gentrification and the Revanchist City. London: Routledge, 1996.

Here’s the playlist:
Malvina Reynolds – “Little Boxes”
Jonathan Richman – “New Kind of Neighborhood”
Arcade Fire – “Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)”
Pretenders – “My City was Gone”
The Kinks – “Scrapheap City”
Talking Heads (official) – “(Nothing But) Flowers”
Lou Reed – “Hold On”
Reagan Youth – “Urban Savages”
Aus Rotten – “American Ethic”
Oi Polloi (Official) – “Let’s Go!”
MDC – Millions Of Dead Cops – “Church and State (Live at CBGBs 1983)”

And here’s part 1!

Part two examined the gentrification of Seattle’s Central District. Before the USA’s Civil Rights Era, the urban core of Seattle was where African-Americans could work, live, and go to school. Nowadays, as Draze raps, “The Hood Ain’t the Same”. We also looked at how punks have reacted to gentrification in Washington DC (and how agents of gentrification in DC have reacted to punks like Ian MacKaye). Finally, we looked at the wider punk reaction to gentrification and the myth of ‘progress’.

Here’s the reading list:

-“Chapter One: ‘Hit the Road Jack:’ The Rise and Fall of Seattle’s Black Music Scene, 1945-1960s” from, “This is Not For You: The Rise and Fall of Music Milieux in Seattle and the Pacific Northwest, 1950s -1990s” https://era.library.ualberta.ca/…/a5ea3770-1f0b-438c-a4b4-d…

-“For Punk Music, Gentrification Is the New Ronald Reagan” https://www.citylab.com/…/gentrification-is-the-new…/379711/

Here’s the playlist:
Corb Lund– “That’s What Keeps the Rent Down Baby”
Ray Charles – “Rockin’ Chair Blues”
Jimi Hendrix – “Machine Gun”
Draze – “The Hood Ain’t the Same”
Fugazi – “Cashout”
Jack on Fire – “Burn Down the Brixton”
Jello Biafra & D.O.A. – “That’s Progress”
Wraths – “My Home”
Sick Of It All – “District”

And here’s part 2!

Part three focused on gentrification in Vancouver and Edmonton. Edmonton’s current wave of gentrification started with the development of a publicly-funded downtown arena and entertainment district. This is an example of what Peter Moskowitz refers to as “stage 0” of gentrification, when city governments enable “corporate control of neighbourhoods” though municipal policy.

Here is the reading list:

-Peter Moskowitz, “How to Kill a City: Gentrification, Inequality, and the Fight for the Neighborhood”, 2017.
-Amber Dean, “Remembering Vancouver’s Disappeared Women: Settler Colonialism and the Difficulty of Inheritance”, 2015.
-Daniel Johnson, “This Is Our Land!”: Indigenous Rhetoric and Resistance on the Northern Plains. PhD., Diss, University of Alberta, 2014.
-Dwayne Donald, “Edmonton Pentimento: Re-Reading History in the Case of the Papaschase Cree.” Journal of the Canadian Association for Curriculum Studies 2, no. 1 (2004), 21-53.
-Jay Scherer, “Resisting the World-Class City: Community Opposition and the Politics of a Local Arena Development”, Sociology of Sport Journal, 2016, 33, 39-53.
-Jordan Koch, Jay Scherer, and Nicolas Holt, “Slap Shot! Sport, Masculinities, and Homelessness in the Downtown Core of a Divided Western Canadian Inner City”. Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 42(4), 270-294.

Here’s the playlist:

Robin Grey – “The Hackney Gentrification Song”
Alien Boys – “Gentrification”
Paroxysm – “White Picket Fence”
audio/rocketry – “The Way Ahead”
Latcho Drom – “Shit District”
Rebuild/Repair – “Burn Edmonton to the Fucking Ground”
Rebuild/Repair – “Above Ground Cemeteries”
Chain & the Gang – “Devitalize”

And here’s part 3!

 

 

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Tags: Gentrification, Punk, The History of Punk

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