Struggle for the City

Citizenship and Resistance in the Black Freedom Movement

Derek G. Handley

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Hardback

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English

Pennsylvania State University Press
24 September 2024

Communication studies; History of the Americas; Urban & municipal planning

Series: Rhetoric and Democratic Deliberation

The urban renewal policies stemming from the 1954 Housing Act and 1956 Highway Act destroyed the economic centers of many Black neighborhoods in the United States. Struggle for the City recovers the agency and solidarity of African American residents confronting this diagnosis of “blight” in northern cities in the 1950s and 1960s.

Examining Black newspapers, archival documents from Black organizations, and oral histories of community advocates, Derek G. Handley shows how African American residents in three communities—the Hill district of Pittsburgh, the Bronzeville neighborhood of Milwaukee, and the Rondo district of St. Paul—enacted a new form of citizenship to fight for their neighborhoods. Dubbing this the “Black Rhetorical Citizenship,” a nod to the integral role of language and other symbolic means in the Black Freedom Movement, Handley situates citizenship as both a site of resistance and a mode of public engagement that cannot be divorced from race and the effects of racism. Through this framework, Struggle for the City demonstrates how local organizers, leaders, and residents used rhetorics of placemaking, community organizing, and critical memory to resist the bulldozing visions of urban renewal.

By showing how African American residents built political community at the local level and by centering the residents in their own narratives of displacement, Handley recovers strategies of resistance that continue to influence the actions of the Black Freedom Movement, including Black Lives Matter.

By: Derek G. Handley
Imprint: Pennsylvania State University Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm, Spine: 21mm
Weight: 145g
ISBN: 9780271097756
ISBN 10: 0271097752
Series: Rhetoric and Democratic Deliberation
Pages: 222
Publication Date: 24 September 2024
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Derek G. Handley is Assistant Professor in the English Department at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. He is also affiliated faculty in the African Diaspora Studies Department and in the Urban Studies program.

Reviews for Struggle for the City: Citizenship and Resistance in the Black Freedom Movement

“Not only does Derek Handley present a compelling account—sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes hopeful—of local communities fighting for their survival against forces of racial and economic inequality and control, he provides fresh perspectives on key concepts like publicity and citizenship that warrant serious scholarly reflection. This book is a must read for anyone hoping to understand historical and contemporary challenges to and opportunities for enacting vibrant, democratic public worlds.” —Robert Asen,author of School Choice and the Betrayal of Democracy: How Market-Based Education Reform Fails Our Communities