Social Justice Commons^™

Hudson Yards: Hybrid Capital's New Home, Massimo D. Scoditti

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis focuses on the material and metaphysical aspects of the Hudson Yards, the largest private development in US History. With its roots in the administration of Michael Bloomberg, the site is representative of neoliberal ideology. It is also one in which cultural production is central. This is in terms of the rationalization and mythos of the building of the space itself and the dreamworlds created to obscure the mechanisms of extraction and accumulation that make such a complex possible. The Hudson Yards is particularly interesting because, as Cindi Katz might suggest, topography lines connect it to transnational capital. And …

Maternal Wellness: Self, Matrescence, Obstetric Violence, And Self-Care, Vanessa V. Vales-Lewis

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this dissertation, I engage in a self-study through an examination of my experience of matrescence (i.e., the transition to motherhood). I discuss my praxis in the development of a self-study on maternal wellness as it applies to my well-being as both a researcher and the researched. In Chapter 1, I preface this study by highlighting critical scholars and the bricoleurs who have been foundational in my undertaking of this work on a narrative study on maternal wellness. Using bricolage as part of a research methodological framework that involved key scholarly methodologies of authentic inquiry, emergence and contingence, and narratology, …

Disrepair, Displacement And Distress: Finding Housing Stories Through Data Visualizations, Jennifer Cheng

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

While the COVID-19 pandemic is at its forefront a health crisis, it also triggered an upheaval in the already dire housing situation endured by many New York City renters. Tenant fears of rent increases, deferred maintenance, and displacement certainly worsened during the pandemic. But the housing crisis is, at the same time, part of a perpetual real estate cycle contingent on speculation and the symbiotic relationship of landlords, investors, and lenders in pursuit of profit – to the detriment of tenants.

Following years of lending deregulation, funding cuts, and tax reform, the financialization of housing emerged. Real estate speculation, where …