Tectonic Urbania

Modern cities are a place of simultaneous decay and resurrection. Part of this process is the creation of an ever-widening chasms between rich and poor. This goes hand in hand with the shifting demographic fault lines that have created new spaces of fusion and collision, where inhabitants now live with people they would have never known just a few years ago. In this series, we will: explore how an 80-year-old woman – with the support of her neighbors – fights to stay in her home as landlords seek to cash in on rising rents; how a young Anglo woman seeks acceptance in Chinatown; get a sonic journey of the city’s lost and nearly forgotten history; follow high school students, poor and well off, as they venture into places they once feared; listen in on an encounter between a homeless woman with mental health issues and the police who confront her; get a close up view of graffiti wars between street artists and the municipal cleanup crews charged with erasing their work; and follow an ESL teacher who learns that irregular verbs are far from the toughest part of living here for a young Syrian bewildered by his new life in an incomprehensible city.
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Modern cities are a place of simultaneous decay and resurrection. Part of this process is the creation of an ever-widening chasms between rich and poor. This goes hand in hand with the shifting demographic fault lines that have created new spaces of fusion and collision, where inhabitants now live with people they would have never known just a few years ago. In this series, we will: explore how an 80-year-old woman – with the support of her neighbors – fights to stay in her home as landlords seek to cash in on rising rents; how a young Anglo woman seeks acceptance in Chinatown; get a sonic journey of the city’s lost and nearly forgotten history; follow high school students, poor and well off, as they venture into places they once feared; listen in on an encounter between a homeless... Show full description