Territorial Stigmatization and Advanced Urban Marginality

Description

Territorial Stigmatization, the Rent Gap, and Advanced Urban Marginality

Dr Tom Slater (University of Edinburgh)

 

Abstract

In this lecture I make use of the concepts of territorial stigmatisation (Loic Wacquant) and the rent gap (Neil Smith) to explore the loss of place in gentrifying contexts.  Blending fieldwork data with secondary sources, I argue that there is an intense and direct relationship between the defamation of poor neighbourhoods and the process of gentrification, to the point where it becomes necessary to fuse these two concepts together in order to interpret and challenge the housing crises faced by people living at the bottom of the class structure in cities.  I illustrate how territorial stigmatisation provides the groundwork and ideological justification for a thorough class transformation of space involving evictions, demolition, land clearance, and then the construction of housing and services aimed at more affluent residents.
 

 

 

 

 

Open to all. No registration required

Part of the City Seminar Research Group series