Reverend, Craig J. Wright is the Pastor of Calvary African Methodist Episcopal Church in Glen Cove, New York, and serves as the Associate Vice President for Equity, Inclusion and Affirmative Action at Nassau Community College, Garden City, New York. He has been a college administrator and student advocate since 1988, and a preacher of the Gospel since 1992.…
Bibliography: “Casa Loma: Saving Toronto’s fabulous folly.” The Toronto Star” Opinion. Web. 21 May, 2011. 6 November, 2013.…
Ray, Robert B. “The Thematic Paradigm.” Signs of Life in the USA. ed. Sonia Maasik and Jack Solomon. Boston. Bedford/St. Martins. 2012. 377-386. Print.…
The small community of Canton, Illinois was booming in the 1960’s. From coal mining to factory work there were many growing opportunities that drew more and more citizens to the community. Along with the growing population, came the demand for more facilities. As the late 1960’s rolled…
Cities grew up and out, with such famed architects as Louis Sullivan working on and perfecting skyscrapers (first appearing in Chicago in 1885). The city grew from a small compact one that people could walk through to get around to a huge metropolis that required commuting by electric trolleys. Electricity, indoor plumbing, and telephones made city life more alluring. Department stores like Macy’s (in New York) and Marshall Field’s (in Chicago) provided urban working-class jobs and also attracted urban middle-class shoppers. Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie told of a woman’s escapades in the big city and made cities dazzling and attractive. However, the move to city produced lots of trash, because while farmers always reused everything or fed “trash” to animals, city dwellers, with their mail-order stores like Sears and Montgomery Ward, which made things cheap and easy to buy, could simply throw away the things that they didn’t like anymore.…
American Architecture: Ideas and Ideologies in the Late Twentieth Century, Paul HEYER, 1993, John Wiley and Sons.…
In 1949 America was beginning it’s peak. There was a postwar boom, sending the economy to an all time high. The “baby boom” began, and in result people began to move out of inner city departments and into suburban homes. With the increase in home purchases also comes the need for more stuff; washers, driers, furniture, decor, and many more necessary home items. We see this with the Loman family when Linda and Willy discuss all the home additions they need to pay for. “ Well, there’s a nine-sixty for the washing machine.…
Every other building of substance in Englewood seemed to be charged with the energy of anticipation, not just of the world’s fair but of a grand future expanding far beyond the fair’s end. Within just a couple of blocks of sixty-third rose huge, elaborate houses of many colors and textures, and down the street stood the Timmerman Opera House and the adjacent New Julian Hotel, whose owners had spent heavily on fine materials and expert craftsman. In contrast, Holmes’s building was dead space, like the corner of a room where the gaslight could not reach” (Larson…
“American corporate designers were learned in Modernist theory, but nevertheless found bulbous aerodynamic bodyshells an appropriately slick garb for wares of a vigorous, efficient society with an aggressive faith in its future. Flashy exaggeration at the hands of the stylists, ever compelled to ‘improve’ on last year’s model, gave streamlining a bad name.” (Hodges, Coad, Stone, Sparke, Aldersey-Williams, The New Design Source Book, 1992, p.158) Discuss in relationship to the ‘innovation’ in household designs of the 1950’s, how do these designs compare to similar examples of today? Do designers today feel “compelled to improve on last years model?…
In Price’s view the United States is consumed with flashy displays of wealth. Americans will partake in anything that is bold or bright. In the first half of the essay, the author discusses the fact that the new popular item on the market is a plastic flamingo, which represents “wealth and pizzazz.” Price’s blunt sentence “But no matter”, after explaining that flamingos had been hunted to extinction in Florida shows, in reality, she is ashamed and angered by this fact, which represents how our old, poor society has died. Even worse she explains how businesses succeeded off of selling flamingo products or naming businesses after flamingos. Flamingos “stand out” in one’s lawn which shows “extravagance and “boldness” in analogizing for the generation raised in the Depression. People spent money on a useless plastic bird – a foolish action none would have thought to do before this. Jennifer Price use of such emphatic words let readers imagine strong or rather bold nature or American culture.…
Gentrification, when wealthy individuals buy and renovate houses in poor neighborhoods, a word often associated with the displacement of poor residents of run-down urban neighborhoods. Gentrification has its pro’s and con’s, so naturally the supporters list the positives, while non-supporters do the opposite. In “Go Forth and Gentrify?” by Dashka Slater, the author explores the positives of gentrification for the community, newcomers, and longtime residents. Dashka Slater, a journalist who often appears in the New York Times, Sierra, and San Francisco Magazine. Mother Jones, a liberal magazine, published “Go Forth and Gentrify” in July 2007 encouraging home buyers to buy houses in poor urban neighborhoods. During this time housing prices were decreasing and the housing bubble was about to burst. Many families lost their homes to foreclosure and had nowhere to go. As a suggestion, Slater urges readers that it is alright to move into a poor neighborhood because the home buyer will positively impact the neighborhood.…
In the early twentieth century, an incredible artistic movement occurred that prompted an aesthetic reform for American living. The movement was known as Arts and Crafts. A mix of progressives consisting of designers, architects, and artists promoted simplified architectural style, handicraft production, and wholesome environments. The following essay will examine the many social and economic influences that shaped the new housing developments as well as what effects the ‘modern’ bungalow style housing had on the American family.…
When Violet Mullen was younger, she used to watch a black and white show with her dads called the ‘Twilight Zone’. The show revolved itself with an alternate universe: it’s like your own snow globe world tilted upside down while the fallen snow represented heavy spontaneity for your ordinary life. Violet gaped through her bus window, she hesitantly settled her hand on the glass, almost afraid the window held vigorous static like a television. The cool glass confirmed Violet that she wasn’t watching an episode of the ‘Twilight Zone’. This city, the capital of Hathor Cult, was real as Donald Trump’s presidency. Violet saw so many Skyscrapers overlap each other like manufactured Legos, which Violet awed at because she lived in the suburbs of Virginia.…
As modifications are made and longtime residents removed the region irreversibly changes into something new, and all of the personality along with its rich antiquity is replaced by frilly boutiques and cookie cutter housing complexes. The area begins to take on a new life, and as this transition takes place the things that made a neighborhood a loving memory quickly becomes a fleeting idea. This isn’t to say that change is necessarily unwarranted, but if something is going to change it should because the people have allowed it, and they will be around to enjoy those changes. The modifications brought forth by gentrification are solely enjoyed by those moving in. The residents being forced out are gone before the area has fully reached its new chic status. With them goes the memory of their neighborhood all the child banter from playing baseball in the lot, along with the gossip filled bodega at the corner of the street. All of this replaced by upscale dessert shops and high rise, lofts for newfound professionals. The security that a home used to provide is stripped for the benefit of those that want to live in the new “it” area. Nation (2016) writes “Developers targeting young professionals and global investors have sent a surge of capital into places where public and private dollars once fled. Families in these areas that never escaped the recession are now feeling the shove.” This…
American culture had a slow steady start, and for a while it seemed as though it would remain that way. This was until an island on the coast of New York changed American culture and society. This island was called Coney Island. What was Coney Island and what did it bring to the Americans? It was an island that fulfilled the changing wants of American’s. This island influenced American’s wants from labor, and high society to leisure. Though the island didn’t remain on its all-time-high forever, it caused a “turn of the century.” This “turn of the century,” was a vast shift in the mass culture of America.…