Each semester, the Initiative on Cities hosts a recurring workshop led by Professor Japonica Brown-Saracino, an Urban Faculty Fellow at the IOC, which invites faculty, graduate students, and postdoctoral scholars to explore issues of urban inequality.
These workshops approach the topic of urban inequalities from different disciplinary, methodological, and theoretical angles, exploring themes that include cities and race, economics, health, politics and governance, education, youth, climate change, resilience, sexualities and gender, marketing, and neighborhoods.
Open to doctoral students and faculty from across the university and the broader Boston area, the workshop brings together students and faculty whose work addresses theoretical and policy concerns. Before each meeting, a working paper is circulated for participants to read. At the workshop, the author will provide a brief presentation that offers background information about their work, while the remainder of the time will be devoted to feedback and conversation.
In Spring 2025, the workshop will be held at the Initiative on Cities (75 Bay State Road) on Mondays from 12 to 1:30 PM. Lunch will be provided.
If you are interested in presenting at the workshop, please contact Andrew Ward at amward@bu.edu.
Spring 2025
- February 24, 2025: Dr. Raquel L. Jimenez, Harvard University
- “A Storied City”
- March 17, 2025: Yasemin Girgin, Ph.D Student, Boston University
- “Politics of Gentrification: Desecularization of Culture in Istanbul”
- April 10, 2025: Madalina Mazaros, Ph.D. Candidate, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER)
- “A Housing Crisis Spillover: Housing in Luxembourg and Cross-Border Gentrification”
- April 14, 2025: Dr. Sarah Mayorga, Brandeis University
- “Owners, renters, and the social relations of private property”
Fall 2024
- September 30, 2024: Dr. Ekédi Mpondo-Dika, UC Berkeley (hybrid), co-sponsored by BU’s Precarity Lab
- “The Push and Pull of Poverty: Cyclical Ties in a Truly Disadvantaged Network”
- October 28, 2024: Dr. Jonathan Wynn, University of Massachusetts Amherst (in person) and Dr. Andrew Deener, University of California, Santa Barbara (via Zoom)
- “The Urban Way: Divisions”
- November 25, 2024: Dr. Louise Seamster, University of Iowa
- “The Flint Water Coup: Debt at the End of Democracy?”
Spring 2024
- March 22, 2024: Dr. James DeFilippis, Rutgers University
- “Public-Making in Hyper-Diversity: Politics, Elections, and the Democratic Party in Queens, NY”
- April 5, 2024: Andrew Ward, Ph.D. Student in Sociology, Boston University
- “Rent Control or Damage Control? Tensions in Boston and Massachusetts’ Housing Policies”
- May 3, 2024: Dr. Timothy Weaver, SUNY Albany
- “Resistance and Rebellion: Egalitarianism in New York City”
Fall 2023
- September 22, 2023: Dr. Kenton Card, Postdoctoral Research Associate, Initiative on Cities
- “The Intricate Path to Progressive Policy: How Tenants, Sanders, and AOC Influenced the Democratic Party”
- November 3, 2023: Dr. Molly Richard, Postdoctoral Scholar, Center for Innovation in Social Science
- “Community-Level Determinants of Homelessness: Differences by Race and the Role of Structural Racism”
- December 1, 2023: Landon Lauder, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Boston University
- “A Queer Scattering: LGBTQ+ Individuals and Dispersed Communities in Boston and Providence”
Spring 2023
- January 27, 2023: Julian Hartman, Ph.D. Student of Sociology at the University of Arizona
- “Managerial Urban Entrepreneurialism: Universities, Hospitals, and Urban Renewal in Boston and Cambridge”
- February 24, 2023: Dr. Stephanie Ternullo, Harvard University
- “The Politics of Housing in a Democratic Suburb”
- April 7, 2023: Dr. Meaghan Stiman, College of William and Mary
- “The Social Life of Zoning”
- April 21, 2023: Dr. Maria Sulimma, University of Freiburg
- “Gentrification, Leisure, and the Contemporary Novel”
Fall 2022
- September 23, 2022: dr. devin michelle bunten, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- “Gentrification, Geography, and Racial Capital”
- November 4, 2022: Dr. Camille Peterson, Visiting Associate Professor, Boston University
- “Oldest City: St. Augustine, FL in the Heritage Industrial Complex”
- December 2, 2022: Dr. Lacee Satcher, Boston College
- “A [Cautionary] Tale of Three Cities: Insights on the Impacts of Climate Change Among Older Black Americans in the Urban South”
Spring 2022
- February 11, 2022: Landon Lauder, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Boston University
- “Blindfolded and Bound: The Homonormative Urban Lens”
- March 25, 2022: Dr. Andrew McCumber, Postdoctoral Associate, Earth & Environment, Boston University
- “The Pest We All Live With: Cultural Meaning and the Life and Death of Rats”
- April 8, 2022: Dr. Brandi Thompson Summers, University of California, Berkeley
- “Black Pasts + Presence: Anarchonautic Urbanism and the Spatial (Re)configuration of Black Life”
- April 22, 2022: Thomas Benson, Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science and International Relations, University of Delaware
- “Urban Governance and Sustainability in Boston”
Fall 2021
- September 24, 2021: Dr. David Carballo, Boston University
- “Social Institutions, Governance, Infrastructure, and Resiliency in the Indigenous Cities of Mesoamerica”
- October 22, 2021: dr. devin michelle bunten, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- “Gentrification: New Theory, Measurement, and Empirics”
- November 5, 2021: Adrianna Spindle-Jackson, Ph.D. Candidate in Social Work, Boston University
- “‘It’s Mental, it’s Spiritual, it’s Emotional to Me’: Exploring Black Residents’ Experiences with Gentrification in Detroit, MI”
- December 3, 2021: Dr. Greggor Mattson, Oberlin College
- “Gay Bars Were Never Safe Spaces”
Spring 2021
- February 5, 2021: Urban Ideashop, co-hosted with BU URBAN
- March 5, 2021: Noha Roushdy, Ph.D. Candidate in Anthropology, Boston University
- “Education, Class, and Urban Belonging in Cairo”
- March 19, 2021: Dr. Zawadi Rucks-Ahidiana, SUNY Albany
- “Bi-Racial Narratives in a Multi-Racial City: Representations of Race and Gentrification in San Francisco”
- April 2, 2021: Gokhan Mulayim, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Boston University
- “Spatializing a ‘Peculiar Good’: Private Security Markets in Istanbul”
- April 16, 2021: Dr. Leïly Hassaine Blau, Aix-Marseille University
- “Elite in its Territories: Financiarisation and Privatisation of Urban Space”
- April 30, 2021: Christina Chica, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, University of California, Los Angeles
- “Queering the Disaster Response: LGBT+ Responses in Mexico City to the Ongoing COVID-19 Pandemic”
Fall 2020
- October 16, 2020: Dr. Sharon Cornelissen, Harvard University
- “The Urban Farmers: Middle-Class Dreams, Misfortunes, and the Myth of the $500 Abandoned House”
- October 30, 2020: Maria Codlin, Ph.D. Candidate in Archaeology, Boston University
- “Feeding a City: Hunting and Husbandry at the Ancient Mexican City of Teotihuacan”
- November 13, 2020: Dr. Jennifer Candipan, Harvard University
- “Trajectories of Change and Persistence in Neighborhood Attainment”
- November 20, 2020: Erick Berrelleza, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Boston University
- “Getting to Church in the Nuevo South: Religious Practice as Resistance”
- December 4, 2020: Dr. Jessica Simes, Boston University
- “Unavoidable Surveillance”
Fall 2019
- September 13, 2019: Dr. Robin Bartram, Tulane University
- “Punishing the Privileged: Frontline Workers and the City of Responsibility”
- September 27, 2019: Jake Watson, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Boston University
- “Refugees and Incorporation Projects”
- October 11, 2019: Ladin Bayurgil, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Boston University
- “Caught Between Political Opposition and Economic Gain: Homeowner-initiated Urban Transformation in Istanbul”
- October 25, 2019: Dr. Daniel Erker, Boston University
- “American Myths of Linguistic Assimilation: A Sociolinguistic Rebuttal”
- November 8, 2019: Dat Nguyen, Ph.D. Candidate in Anthropology, Boston University
- “Mindful Engagement: Urban Buddhism and the New Middle-Class in Late-socialist Vietnam”
- December 6, 2019: Dr. Theo Greene, Bowdoin College
- “Street Corner Citizenship: Gay Neighborhoods and the Self-enfranchisement of Queer Youth of Color”
Spring 2019
- February 8, 2019: Dr. Kristin Perkins, Harvard University
- “Changes in Household Composition and Children’s Educational Attainment”
- March 1, 2019: Etyelle Pinheiro De Araujo, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro
- “Every morning, One Struggle: Narratives, Interaction and Resistance of Mothers against Police Violence.”
- March 29, 2019: Whitney Gecker, Boston University
- “ ‘It’s more diverse than people think’: Grappling with Diversity and Inequality in a Privileged Suburb.”
- April 12, 2019: Dr. Amber Spry, Brandeis University
- “American Identity and Political Protest”
- April 26, 2019: Dr. Anthony Pratcher III, Brown University
- “The Colored Metropolis: Racial Integration as a Quotient of Metropolitan Development”
- May 3, 2019: Dr. Elaine Nsoesie, Boston University
- “Sociodemographic Factors, the Built Environment and Neighborhood Crime Rates”
Fall 2018
- September 21, 2018: Dr. Jonathan Colins, Brown University
- “Local Democracy Matters: Deliberative Culture, Public School Satisfaction, and Student Performance”
- October 5, 2018: Clarissa Dos Santos Velosa, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Boston University
- “Gentrification in the City of Belo Horizonte, Brazil? A Neighborhood and Its Urban Processes”
- October 26, 2018: Taylor Cain, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Boston University
- “Raising City Kids: Images of Family, Childhood, and Belonging in Boston”
- November 9, 2018: Dr. David M. Carballo, Boston University
- “Social Inequality and Community Archaeology at America’s First Metropolis: New Research at Teotihuacan, Mexico”
- November 30, 2018: Ladin Bayurgil, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Boston University
- “Caught between Economic Gain and Political Opposition: Homeowner Initiated Urban Transformation in Istanbul”
- December 7, 2018: Dr. Yanilda Gonzalez, University of Chicago
- “From Victims to Resilient Citizens: The Policy Feedback Effects of State Violence”