Jane Jacobs’, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, predominantly allows readers to see cities as having ‘life cycles,’ as determined by their architectural nature. Given that, city planners design urban living according to how they think such living spaces should work. Jacobs on the other hand, attacks the “orthodox” city planning technique for the impacts actually imparted onto those dwelling in re-designed portions of the city.
In this piece, Jacobs moreover disproves of the lack of diversity presented in urban city planning, which labels heterogeneous areas as areas absent in beauty. Jacobs explains that uniformity kills the life that should exist in cities. There should be dense city life according to Jacobs to generate vivacity and rid dullness. Visual order should not be a problem as considered by urban planners, who focus on primarily funding regions of newer housing and less ethnic individual- or, in more extreme cases creating fake diverse-looking spaces. People ARE the city, and these redevelopment efforts create monotony by subdividing individuals. Moreover, the most dampening feature of city planning on city regions is lack of social nature within city folks. The sharp distinctions within the massive amenities bordering of regions and the internal housing, as well as, the inconstancy in slum life is all due to lack of effort in attention to quality of life of underprivileged city dwellers. Rather there exists an interest in modernizing and building more economic centers in the city, to please the audience who can afford it and who will moreover be benefitted by change.
Immediately, what came to mind as I read this piece was the effect that media had on conditioning individuals, to deal with the massive redevelopments in city life during the 1950s. There is quite a bit of commercials available of YouTube, however, the one provided above, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dZe_cmZNDA, speaks volumes to much of what Jacobs points out in her piece. The influence of commercials that promote objects such as toy cars or toy bulldozers, increase the likeness for automobiles and the interest for accommodation of such modes of transportation that would diminish sidewalk sizes and, openness for pedestrians of the city. Nevertheless, introducing construction as something ordinary or acceptable to families that have children, as the children will play with these toys and not notice the damaging effects construction is having on the life of the city around them. Not to mention, commercials of dolls and board games, promotes inside play time and less outside socialization. Busy city life and urban planning decreases family spaces and green spaces which is why many of these toys are targeted for backyard or most importantly indoor purposes. We also do not see many commercials with individuals of color, which shows that the relation that those who can afford luxuries like toys were Caucasian, with the exception of a selected portion of colored individuals, that nevertheless mimics diversity within city lifestyles, but, does in fact instead promote homogeny in those areas of wealth in the city. Therefore, as stated in her novel, “It follows that these confusing creatures—so many people gathered together—should be sorted out and stashed away as decently and quietly as possible, like chickens on a modern egg-factory farm” (Jacobs 220,) the lifelessness which sprouts out of sectoring city development theorizes positive change for the economic well-being of a city, yet, in reality destroys the live and diversity within it, ever so apparent in the media and commercials that act to condition city dwellers into accepting the way of life they have unknowingly been kenneled into.
Questions
- How do you think people of color fare as the media is involved? Does this conditioning of higher-class individuals to accept city life translate to those living in slums, or, is it apparent to those living in worse conditions that the city is habituating their citizens to a less social/diverse city life?
- What kinds of toys do you think were the most popular in the 1950s and 1960s, and what agendas do you think are behind commercializing such toys to families?
- Do commercials still play a role in acclimating individuals to certain sectoring lifestyles today? Do you think this is all part of urban planning in modern day as well, what factors- other than economic benefit- goes into the ideas that develop today’s children toys?
