Resisting Racism
Along with the history of individual and institutional racism, it is
important to also acknowledge the long tradition of work against racism
that continues today. Anthropologist Steven Gregory’s ethnography Black
Corona (1998) tells the story of the organized political resistance by a
predominantly African American community in Corona, Queens, in New York
City, when confronted by attitudes and policy expressions of racial
discrimination. The African American community in Corona dates back to
the 1820s, and it expanded under an influx of middle- class residents
from Harlem in the first half of the twentieth century. By the 1970s,
however, Corona, like many other urban U.S. communities, began to feel
the devastating impact of globalization, particularly flexible
accumulation, as New York City’s economy deindustrialized. At this
time, the city’s economy moved from an industrial and manufacturing
base to one driven by finance, information, and services (Baker 1995;
Harvey 1990). As New York lost thousands of manufacturing jobs and
billions of dollars in tax revenue and federal funds, residents of
Corona struggled during the transition. In the face of drastic
government cutbacks to basic community services such as housing,
education, and public safety, residents of Corona’s LeFrak City— a
public housing complex containing 6,000 rental apartments— mobilized to
demand sustained public investment in the maintenance and security of
the property from their landlord, the City of New York. Confronting
stereotypes of the apartment complex as a site of crime, welfare
dependency, and family disorganization, African American parents in
LeFrak City founded Concerned Community Adults (CCA), a community- based
civic association, to engage in neighborhood improvement projects and
strengthen relationships with the city’s politicians and agencies. The
CCA’s Youth Forum organized neighborhood young people for social
activities and leadership formation; together with the CCA, it worked to
improve relations with the local police, who regularly harassed youth in
the area. Through community- based action, LeFrak City residents worked
with churches, community groups, and informal associations to establish
their position as political actors, assert control over the
neighborhood’s physical condition, and insist on self- definition
rather than accept the stereotypes held by surrounding communities and
city leaders. In the early 1990s, the Port Authority of New York and
New Jersey— which controls the area’s airports, bridges, and port
facilities— announced plans to build
an elevated light rail train between Manhattan’s central business
district and LaGuardia Airport that would cut directly through the heart
of Corona’s African American community. Residents had had extensive
negative experiences battling the city over earlier plans to expand
LaGuardia, which abuts Corona, that involved the loss of waterfront
properties to the construction of runways, highway access, and exposure
to the pollution of adjacent Flushing Bay. In its new plan, the Port
Authority, representing the City of New York, argued that the city
needed improved public transportation between Manhattan and LaGuardia to
compete in the global economy and in the burgeoning global financial
services industry. The elevated rail line through Corona, the argument
went, would be good for the city’s economy. Corona residents warned
that construction of this major infrastructure project through their
community would not have any local benefit but instead would generate
severe environmental consequences, lower the quality of life in the
neighborhood, and divide and isolate portions of the community. They
demanded that the rail line be built underground on property already
owned by New York City between Corona and the airport that had been
carved out to build the Grand Central Parkway years earlier. Local
residents formed neighborhood committees and alliances with existing
civic organizations, community groups, and churches. They engaged the
city’s public planning process and established alternative political
forums outside the government’s control to press for their case. They
also created multicultural alliances with concerned groups in
neighboring communities. Eventually the Port Authority abandoned the
planned elevated train. Gregory’s ethnographic study of Corona’s
African American community reveals the power of local communities of
color to mobilize and engage in political activism. It also demonstrates
how such groups can contest the stereotypes of urban black communities
and the practices of racial discrimination and exclusion, whether those
involve housing, policing, or the environmental and community impacts of
public infrastructure projects. For a look at efforts to combat racism
in a different context, see “Anthropologists Engage the World,” on
pages 228–229.
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