A Haven and a Hell

Lance Freeman is a professor in the Urban Planning Program in the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia University. He is the author of There Goes the Hood: Views of Gentrification from the Ground Up (Temple University Press: 2005). He is the co-editor of the ASA community and urban sociology section’s journal City & Community.Lance Freeman is a professor in the Urban Planning Program in the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia University. He is the author of There Goes the Hood: Views of Gentrification from the Ground Up (2005).

Harvey Molotch, coauthor of Urban Fortunes: The Political Economy of Place:
With diligent care, Lance Freeman weighs the hurts and capacities of ghetto life in the United States. In a field grown thick with pronouncement, his steadfast empirical commitment and reasoned analyses correct past misperceptions and open new vistas.

Marcus Anthony Hunter, coauthor of Chocolate Cities: The Black Map of American Life:
Through rigorous sociohistorical analysis, Lance Freeman provides insight into how black ghettos developed and then changed over time, giving readers a good sense of the complicated trajectory of 'the ghetto' in America. A Haven and a Hell is a highly accessible and necessary book for a broader and richer understanding of urban black America.

Ingrid Gould Ellen, coeditor of The Dream Revisited: Contemporary Debates About Housing, Segregation, and Opportunity:
A critical read at a time when gentrification is viewed as threatening the black identity of many urban neighborhoods, this book offers a rich and nuanced history of the ghetto’s role in black American life from the late nineteenth century to the present. Resisting a simple characterization, Freeman shows that while the ghetto has sometimes served as an instrument of subjugation and institutional neglect, it has also offered a refuge that has helped to nurture black culture, institutions, and ideas.

[An] informative sociohistorical analysis . . . For readers of urban history and black history, this is an excellent look at the ghetto’s multifaceted place in American history.