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A People's Guide

A popular geography project that aims to build spatial understandings of power.

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New York

A People’s Guide to New York City (APGTNYC) is an alternative tour guide that documents sites of oppression,resistance, struggle and transformation in New York City.

New York City is a pre-eminent “global city,” in Saskia Sassen’s terms, providing anchorage and support to international flows of capital and information. It is headquarters to hundreds of multi-national firms and the site of the United States’ most prominent stock exchanges. Current day “titans of industry,” such as former Mayor Michael Bloomberg and conservative investor David Koch, join dozens of other billionaires who call New York City home. It is a world-renowned cultural hub for fashion, art and music. Its fiscal crisis now decades past, its “asphalt jungle” pruned and landscaped, New York shares the glitter and cache realized by only a few other world capitals.

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But behind the glitz, glamour and leading men of the Empire City are millions of workers, women, people of color, and immigrants who are responsible for making this global city function. New York is among the most multi-cultural and immigrant-rich cities in the world, and has been thus for much of its history. At the same time, it is also among the most segregated cities in the United States. The homes and neighborhoods of immigrants, people of color, and the working classes lie largely in the so-called ‘outer boroughs’; outside the corporations, neon, and skyscrapers of Manhattan. Yet the dynamic interaction of the “outer” and “inner”boroughs; the productive and disruptive commingling of its peoples; and the ongoing struggles over the production of space are all central to the story of New York.

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Contributors

Penny Lewis

New York City

Penny Lewis is Associate Professor of Labor Studies at the School of Labor and Urban Studies at the City University of New York.

Emily Tumpson Molina

New York City

Emily Tumpson Molina researches and teaches about urban problems and policy, with a particular focus on housing.

Carolina Bank Muñoz

New York City

Carolina Bank Muñoz is Professor of Sociology at Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center.

A People's Guide to Los Angeles

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