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UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO the Mechanics of Race UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO The Mechanics of Race: The Discursive Production of Detroit’s Landscape of Difference A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the Requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Ethnic Studies by Rebecca J. Kinney Committee in charge: Professor Natalia Molina, Chair Professor Lisa Sun-Hee Park, Co-Chair Professor Luis Alvarez Professor Yen Le Espiritu Professor Adria Imada 2011 Copyright Rebecca J. Kinney, 2011 All Rights Reserved The Dissertation of Rebecca J. Kinney is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication on microfilm and electronically: _________________________________________________ _________________________________________________ _________________________________________________ _________________________________________________ Co-Chair _________________________________________________ Chair University of California, San Diego 2011 iii DEDICATION The dissertation is dedicated to: Darlene Hall, Amanda Guanco, André Guanco, and Archer Guanco. Thank you for your love and support throughout this journey. And to John Williams—thank you for always believing. I love you. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Signature Page……………………………………………………………...…………iii Dedication………………………………………………………………………….. …iv Table of Contents…………………………………………………………………... ….v List of Figures……...………………………………………………………………….vi Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………………...vii Vita…..…………………………………………………………………………..........xii Abstract of the Dissertation….………………………………………………..……..xiii Introduction: Tracing the Production of Race in Detroit………………………....... ….1 Part I: “Public” Constructions of Race in the Spaces of the Street............................ ...28 Chapter One: Spatial Imaginary of Public Housing: Constructions and Contradictions of “Brick Cities” ……………………...…………………… ...29 Chapter Two: eRazing Race: Slum Clearance and the Mapping of Displacement…………………………………………….................................89 Part II: Reproducing Race On and Off Screen……...………………………………147 Chapter Three: Detroit’s Post-Industrial Frontier: Gran Torino as Lens into Masculinity and Property in the Post-Industrial City….........……………….148 Chapter Four: Digital Discourse and Memory of the City………..............................192 Conclusion: Denaturalizing Difference………...……………...................................238 Bibliography…………………………………………………….............................. 250 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. Map of Detroit as prepared for the Detroit Housing Commission’s Sixth Annual Report, 1940……...…………………………..………...45 Figure 2. Owner Occupancy Map, Detroit Real Property Survey of 1938….....……103 Figure 3. Substandard Dwelling Units, Detroit Real Property Survey of 1938..……104 Figure 4. Race of Household, Detroit Real Property Survey, 1938.………...……...106 Figure 5. “Redevelopment Projects in Central Area,” Detroit City Plan Commission, October 1959…………………...………….……….....109 Figure 6. Building Fabric Rendering of Black Bottom/Lafayette Park reproduced from Charles Weldheim’s Hilberseimer/Mies van der Rohe, Lafayette Park Detroit.…………………………………….... .141 Figure 7. Aerial Photos of Black Bottom/Lafayette Park reproduced from Charles Weldheim’s Hilberseimer/Mies van der Rohe, Lafayette Park Detroit…………………………………………………..……..143 vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS For support of my work I would like to thank: The University of California’s Fletcher Jones Dissertation Fellowship; UC San Diego, Dean’s Fellowship; California Cultures in Comparative Perspective, Summer Graduate Student Fellowship; Bentley Historical Library, Bordin-Gillette Researcher Travel Fellowship; and the Ethnic Studies Travel Fellowship. I would also like to thank the archivists and librarians at the Burton Historical Library, the Walter P. Reuther Library, and the Bentley Historical Library for their time, expertise, and for lugging hundreds of heavy boxes back and forth. I thank Deanna Neely, for her kind gift of time, candor, and willingness to be interviewed for this project. Her willingness to share her work and life has greatly informed and enriched my work. I’d like to thank my committee for their work and for offering guidance through this process. Natalia Molina, thank you for being so steadfast and consistent in your feedback and support. I thank you most of all for your early intervention— pointing out the disconnect between what I said I wanted to do and what I was actually doing. It was a hard but important critique and the dissertation is better and “more me” for it. Lisa Sun-Hee Park, it has been a long road together! Thank you for your continued support through the Master’s thesis to the dissertation. Your belief in me has been unwavering and your faith in the potential of my work has been essential. Thank you for our conversations about life in the work and for your unfailing candor about my work and the work of the academy. Luis Alvarez, thank you for your vii productive, constructive, and instructive comments very early on in the project and throughout its formation. You have gone above and beyond the role of “outside” member. Yen Le Epiritu, thank you for continually asking hard questions and encouraging me to pursue the layers and nuances of my project—you make my work better through your engagement. Adria Imada, thank you for your consistent encouragement and enthusiasm throughout, I truly appreciate your engagement with my work. A thank you to colleagues who proved to be not only collegial for your mentorship, but true friends: Myrna García, Martha Escobar, Theo Verinakis, and Tere Ceseña. Thank you to Alanna Aiko Moore for your expertise as an Ethnic Studies librarian and your friendship. Thank you to Angela Kong, Martha Luna, and Madelsar Ngiraingas, for making life fun and bearable from the beginning of life here in San Diego. Ang, we’ve been on this journey from Day 1 to the end and I can’t wait to celebrate the completion of your dissertation very soon! Thank you to Michelle Stuckey, who read the earliest drafts of Part I and helped to sharpen my ideas and Long Bui who taught me so much about cyberspace and spaces of the imaginary. And my writing group—Mariola Alvarez, Tania Jabour, and José Fuste—who every two weeks for the last year kicked my work into shape and provided the critique and encouragement to keep me going. Our Tuesday night meetings began at a particularly low point in my process and I thank you for your support, expertise, and encouragement in getting me to the end. viii I would like to thank the many friends who supported me along this journey with their love, encouragement, and support. In particular, Khine Zin Aung, Rupal Shah, Colleen Hilton, and Nancy Saldivar—the laughter, inspiration, joy, strength, good food, medical, legal, and every other kind of advice you bring me are unmeasured. I am so thankful for our friendships and feel lucky that I have shared and continue to share life with you. During this process Marsha, Marshall, Kathy, Ella, and Chloe Williams came into my life. I am fortunate to have gained a loving and supportive family with a mutual love of history, books, and learning. Good times spent in the warmth of your home, with the comfort of your company, delicious food, and bottles of wine have supported and sustained me in so many ways. I know that my love of history begins with stories my grandpa, Richard Hall, would tell me about the heat of working in the foundry and the shenanigans he pulled while aboard his WWII navy ship. And my understandings of home comes from summer afternoons drinking Faygo Rock n’ Rye floats on the porch that my grandma, Dorothy Hall, would make for us. I learned as I grew older that it was a rare gift that I grew up with my great grandmother and grandparents next door and I treasure the stories and life between generations that I just thought was “normal.” I also thank my grandma Sugar, Joanne Kinney, for being one of the most amazing women I know— well into her eighties she provides me with an example of strength, passion for life, and determination that inspires all who know her. ix Thank you to A3, who have been there for every moment big and small, their love, support, and ability to bring laughter to my life is immeasurable. André Guanco, you’ve been part of my life longer than you haven’t and I can’t imagine our family without you. Archer Guanco, you have literally grown up alongside my life in graduate school and finally Beebs is done with school!!! It has been such a joy to be part of your life. And, Amanda Guanco, my big sister, I can’t imagine this world or any other without you to love, fight with, learn from, support, and be supported by. Thank you. Thank you to my mom, Darlene Hall, who unfailingly supports me as I push my boundaries and in all the many steps I take. Thanks in particular for your generosity in my many research trips home to Detroit when you would kindly share her car, house, and time with me so that I could undertake my research—without you the archival work would have been impossible. More importantly, without your belief and encouragement to pursue my biggest dreams from a very early age, I wouldn’t have been able to embark on this work at all. Thank you, Mom, for everything. And John Williams, thank you for being the best partner in life and love. After living with this dissertation day in and day out, you have earned the “H” in this PhD. An “H” to represent not only an enormous amount of help in all phases of the project—but for hope, heart, haven, and home. Your ability to have hope in the face of the uncertain is simultaneously awe-inspiring
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