Reconstructing Times Square
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Reconstructing Times Square
When the big ball drops on New Year's Eve, thousands are there to witness that great glittering sight, while millions more watch on national television. Times Square may be the cultural hub of America, the "Crossroads of the World," but its lights have not always shone as brightly as they do now. Once a glamorous theater district, Times Square and 42nd Street had degenerated into a neighborhood known for the winos and sex shops of "Midnight Cowboy" until New York's business and arts communities stepped in. These advocates of urban revitalization exploited cultural and historic preservation arguments to transform a low-income entertainment district into a Disney-fied tourist mecca. Where Ratso Rizzo once kicked cars and "hookers" plied their trade, Mickey Mouse now greets visitors from atop a Disney superstore surrounded by rising office towers, theaters, and theme restaurants—all thanks to huge tax subsidies and government support. Alexander Reichl tells the fascinating story of how cultural politics and economic greed transformed the city's physical and social environment with an ongoing multibillion-dollar redevelopment program, changing the district from a symbol of urban decline to one of urban renaissance. He explains the political significance of the historic preservation and arts-related approach to urban revitalization, showing how it was used to appeal to the upscale values of middle-class New Yorkers often hostile to urban renewal. He also examines the role of the Walt Disney Company in the project and demonstrates its power to redefine a premier public space. In telling the story of Times Square, Reichl reveals much about politics and power at the city level and their relationship to the development of urban space. He frames his lively narrative with an illuminating account of how historic preservation initiatives at all government levels have displaced large-scale federal urban renewal programs as the dominant approach to urban development, and he shows the importance of political discourse and cultural politics in mobilizing public support for urban redevelopment. Now that it has been reconfigured for the 21st century, Times Square provides a rich and multifaceted case for exploring the latest trends in urban renewal. Yet Reichl suggests much that has happened here is regrettable: the ousting of low-income citizens to serve commercial interests, the loss of a culturally diverse entertainment district, and the failure to address persistent class- and race-based segregation in a central urban area. By getting to the heart of the Great White Way, Reconstructing Times Square provides an important look at urban renewal-and politics—in a changing America.
Authentic Reconstruction
Notions of authenticity lie at the heart of many questions about heritage and identity in the built environment. These questions are most pertinent when buildings have been destroyed in disaster or war, and the built fabric is being reconstructed to reinstate traditional or historic appearances in place of what was lost. Authentic Reconstruction examines this idea of reconstruction, using it as a prompt to examine a range of deeper issues on heritage and the built environment. From post-WWII reconstruction programmes through to the rebuilding of historic cultural landscapes lost in natural disasters, this collection of essays by heritage specialists provides a wide range of case-studies and discussions. Each presents responses to crises and lessons learned, in order to extrapolate general guidelines for future actions by politicians, architects and planners in reconstructing buildings. The book also looks beyond disaster and war, noting how authenticity bears on political intentions and image building, exploring how reconstruction is used to tell a political or historical story, so conditioning the ways in which the built environment is perceived and appreciated by its users. This is not just about the buildings as bricks and mortar, but about perceptions of identity and the social and historical values which buildings and spaces embody for a richly diverse population. This book will be valuable to all who are concerned with heritage as practitioners or consumers, particularly those concerned with reconstruction and the creation of authentic places and experiences: architects, architectural historians, town planners, preservationists, conservationists, and those involved in heritage management and material culture.
Fictions Inc.
Author: Ralph Clare
language: en
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Release Date: 2014-09-11
Fictions Inc. explores how depictions of the corporation in American literature, film, and popular culture have changed over time. Beginning with perhaps the most famous depiction of a corporation—Frank Norris’s The Octopus—Ralph Clare traces this figure as it shifts from monster to man, from force to “individual,” and from American industry to multinational “Other.” Clare examines a variety of texts that span the second half of the twentieth century and beyond, including novels by Thomas Pynchon, William Gaddis, Don DeLillo, Richard Powers, and Joshua Ferris; films such as Network, Ghostbusters, Gung Ho, Office Space, and Michael Clayton; and assorted artifacts of contemporary media such as television’s The Office and the comic strips Life Is Hell and Dilbert. Paying particular attention to the rise of neoliberalism, the emergence of biopolitics, and the legal status of “corporate bodies,” Fictions Inc. shows that representations of corporations have come to serve, whether directly or indirectly, as symbols for larger economic concerns often too vast or complex to comprehend. Whether demonized or lionized, the corporation embodies American anxieties about these current conditions and ongoing fears about the viability of a capitalist system.