Urban Studies and Planning Commons^™

The Impact Of Concentrations Of African Americans And Latinos/Latinas On Neighborhood Social Cohesion In High Poverty United States Neighborhoods, Laurie A. Walker, Daniel Brisson

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

United States research concludes concentrations of Latinos/Latinas and African Americans have a negative impact on Neighborhood Social Cohesion (NSC); however, European research finds higher levels of NSC when controlling for measures of concentrated disadvantage. This study utilizes a longitudinal stratified random sample of 7,495 households in 430 Census Blocks within 10 United States cities that participated in the Making Connections Initiative. Results show higher NSC is associated with higher percentages of residents who are Latino/Latina, African American, and homeowners when controlling for measures of concentrated disadvantage. The study findings challenge the stigma associated with concentrations of racial minorities in …

Pregnant And Poor In The Suburb: The Experiences Of Economically Disadvantaged Women Of Color With Prenatal Services In A Wealthy Suburban County, Linda E. Francis, Candyce S. Berger, Marianne Giardini, Carolyn Steinman, Karina Kim

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

This study explores the perinatal care experiences of disadvantaged women of color in a wealthy U.S. suburb. The women were asked to discuss the availability of health and social services during pregnancy, continuity of provider and/or treatment, communication issues with their providers, and the amount and type ofsupport and resources available. Many of the questions covered in literature on urban poverty emerged as well in this suburban sample, including economic and psychosocial barriers, and continuity and communication issues between low-income/minority women and providers of health and social services. Additional barriers in the suburbs were also discussed, including problems of access …

Finding And Keeping Affordable Housing: Analyzing The Experiences Of Single-Mother Families In North Philadelphia, Susan Clampet-Lundquist

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

The location, availability, and quality of housing shapes one's social networks, affects access to jobs, and impacts on social relations within the housing unit. However, access to affordable housing is limited for a significant portion of the population in the urban United States. In this study, I interviewed eighteen African-American and Puerto Rican single mothers in two low-income neighborhoods of Philadelphia about how they create and maintain their housing arrangements. Within the constraints of an affordable housing shortage, women told me how they struggle to share housing with others, rehab abandoned properties, live in substandard housing, and remain in unsafe …

Serving The Homeless: Evaluating The Effectiveness Of Homeless Shelter Services, George M. Glisson, Robert L. Fischer, Bruce A. Thyer

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

The effects of homeless assistance services at the local level are tremendously difficult to ascertain. In this study, a four-month sample of homeless persons served by a local homeless shelter and case management program were contacted nine to eleven months after receiving services. The findings suggest that the program had some initial success in assisting the homeless clients to locate housing within the first year after leaving the shelter. However, the housing costs paid by these formerly homeless were quite high, with nearly three-quarters of them spending forty percent or more of their income on housing.

Private Food Assistance In A Small Metropolitan Area: Urban Resources And Rural Needs, Joseph J. Molnar, Patricia A. Duffy, Latoya Claxton, Conner Bailey

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

Food banks and other private feeding programs have become an institutionalized component of the social welfare system in over 190 urban areas in the U.S. More recently, private food assistance has gained importance in rural areas as well. The density and capacity of agencies to serve the poor is higher in urban areas than in sparsely populated rural locales where distance and dispersal tend to be barriers to supplying and accessing donated food. Rural food distribution strategies thus must be qualitatively different than those in larger communities, because of the smaller-scale, more informal distributional system. Little is known about how …

Urban Violence Among African American Males: Integrating Family, Neighborhood, And Peer Perspectives, M. Daniel Bennett Jr., Mark W. Fraser

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

Even though rates have declined in recent years, violence is a serious problem in many American cities. This paper reviews recent perspectives on violence among young, urban African American males. Special attention is afforded the "father absent" hypothesis, the effect of poverty, the character of neighborhoods, the roots of self-efficacy, and peer influence, particularly the influence of street codes. The latter are argued both to regulate some situational behavior and to promote the use of violence in disputes over social status, drugs, and money. The authors discuss implications for policy and community development.

"Safe Places To Go And Things To Do": Political Texts From Urban Youth Of Color, Amory Starr

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

This paper is the first to examine the political texts of urban youth of color. It presents their assessments of what kinds of policies and programs would improve their lives.

Review Of Still The Promised City?: African-Americans And New Immigrants In Postindustrial New York. Roger Waldinger. Reviewed By Charles Jaret, Georgia State University, Charles Jaret

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

Roger Waldinger. Still the Promised City?: African-Americans and New Immigrants in Postindustrial New York. New York. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996. $35.00 hardcover.

Moving Along: An Exploratory Study Of Homeless Women With Children Using A Transitional Housing Program, Sondra J. Fogel

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

The increase in the number of women and children who are homeless, particularly in the last fifteen years, has generated the innovation of shelters that combine longer term housing arrangements and social services. These organizations are usually called "transitional housing," intended to assist this population toward the economic goal of "self-sufficiency." The impact and success of this strategy is often debated. However, there has been scant research investigating how residents of this setting use skills and resources to secure housing outcomes and community re-integration. Through multiple in-depth interviews and other qualitative data collecting strategies, a conceptual model is presented which …

Housing And Health In Beijing: Implications Of High-Rise Housing On Children And The Aged, Solvig Ekblad, Finn Werne

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

The authors are at present engaged in a Swedish-Chinese interdisciplinary and crossectional project on housing and health in Beijing. This article is concerned with a literature review on the topic and general observations during two recent visits to China.

After some basic assumptions concerning high-rise dwellings, private space and life style, this paper contains explicit comparisons of the design, use and experience of traditional courtyard houses, flats in midrise and high-rise buildings as well as a comparisons of two vulnerable groups , i.e., children and elderly residents.

The article ends with a discussion, and the authors conclude that city planning …

Factors In Urban Stress, Ian Burton

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

This paper examines changing patterns of health, causes and effects of urban stress, and approaches to the management of stress.

Building Citizen Support For Planning At The Community Level, Barry Checkoway

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

Planning practice is changing. Previous years of economic growth contributed to an increase in federal, state, and local planning agencies, in addition to regional and special purpose bodies with territorial or functional responsibilities. In times of growth, planning was viewed by many as a type of urban engineering and applied social science characterized by objective fact-finding and the so-called rational model. Leading texts emphasized technical research methods and "hard data" analysis, while government guidelines described scientific application of facts (Krueckeberg and Silvers, 1974; Spiegel and Hyman, 1978). Planners were akin to technical experts who analyzed data for other people who …

Factors Distinguishing Urban And Rural State Mental Hospital Patients In Florida, Elane M. Nuehring, Robert A. Ladner

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

This study compares the patients of two state mental hospitals, one serving an urban region, the other a rural district. The purpose is to explore urban and rural patient differences on background, hospital history and experience, post-release living situation, use of community mental health services, and postrelease functioning. A summary attempt to distinguish urban from rural patients using discriminant function analysis established that rural-urban differences exist in symptom manifestation, the patient's personal and social environment, and institutional processing patterns. These patient differences have implications for the development of aftercare services.

Reactions To The Stigmata Of Inner City Living, Jerome Krase

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

This paper discusses the problem of living in a stigmatized inner city community. The reactions of residents are categorized into "Four Moral Careers", and implications for the community of each career are discussed. Major attention is focused upon the "activist" career which aims to overcome the stigma of the community. The activists are discussed and described through the use df materials from intensive interviews of local community leaders who have tried to cope with the stigma of the area. Some suggested implications are made for the application of the ideas presented herein to urban research in general and the provision …

Toward A Working Model For Community Organizing In The 1970'S, John L. Musick, Nancy R. Hooyman

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

The authors critique the service delivery model for solving community problems and stress the value of citizens developing their capabilities to attack the source of problems. A model for grass roots, autonomous, multi-issue citizens organizations is presented.

The Sociology Of The Inner City--*Functionality For Practice, Ivor J. Echols

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

Many aspects of the future seem imponderable, in the sense that they are impossible of reckoning, and into this category falls the plight of cities. That portion of the cities which is marked by physical blight, continuing property and human deterioration, and myriads of problems of survival-the so-called "inner city" is even more elusive of future prediction and remedy. Theoretician and practitioner alike appear to be enmeshed in an endless web of conceptual gossamer, and palliative ministrations to a relative few targets within their purview.

The intent of this paper, however, is not to castigate but rather to challenge the …