Naked City - The Death and Life of Authentic Urban Places

Sharon Zukin argues that the rapid and pervasive demand for authenticity--and the consequent escalating real estate prices--has helped drive out the very people who first lent a neighborhood its authentic aura: immigrants, the working class, and artists. Zukin traces this economic and social evolution in six archetypal New York areas--Williamsburg, Harlem, the East Village, Union Square, Red Hook, and the city's community gardens--and shows that for followers of Jane Jacobs, this transformation is a perversion of what was supposed to happen.