Hamer, Jennifer.
Berkeley : University of California Press, ©2011.
Added to CLICnet on 09/19/2015
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Notes:
- The George Gund Foundation imprint in African American studies.
- Urban poverty, along with all of its poignant manifestations, is moving from city centers to working-class and industrial suburbs in contemporary America. Nowhere is this more evident than in East St. Louis, Illinois. Once a thriving manufacturing and transportation center, East St. Louis is now known for its unemployment, crime, and collapsing infrastructure. Abandoned in the Heartland takes us into the lives of East St. Louis’s predominantly African American residents to find out what has happened since industry abandoned the city, and jobs, quality schools, and city services disappeared, leaving people isolated and imperiled. Jennifer Hamer introduces men who search for meaning and opportunity in dead-end jobs, women who often take on caretaking responsibilities until well into old age, and parents who have the impossible task of protecting their children in this dangerous, and literally toxic, environment. Illustrated with historical and contemporary photographs showing how the city has changed over time, this book, full of stories of courage and fortitude, offers a powerful vision of the transformed circumstances of life in one American suburb. –Publisher’s website.
- Includes bibliographical references and index.
- In America’s heartland — East St. Louisans and their cars — Work and meaning in a jobless suburb — Hustling, clean and dirty — Around here, women never get done workin — Gotta protect my own — The cost of abandonment.
Subjects:
- East Saint Louis (Ill.) — Social conditions — 21st century.
- East Saint Louis (Ill.) — Economic conditions — 21st century.
- Working class — Illinois — East Saint Louis.
- African Americans — Illinois — East Saint Louis.
- Illinois — East Saint Louis. fast (OCoLC)fst01213679
- 2000 – 2099 fast
Requested by Pike, D.