Monthly Archives: November 2015

Kips Bay’s Noise Pollution – First 2 Paragraphs

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It’s five o’clock in the morning and the sirens are already blaring. The red, white, and blue flashing lights pierce through the windows. One street South, you can hear the cheers and roars of a sports  bar that has sponsors from colleges throughout the East Coast, all while happening on a Wednesday. Across the street, you hear the hammering noise and loud barks of construction workers as they begin their day shift. After getting up and walking outside, you notice that there is a massive hole in the ground, inconveniently placed where the ambulances usually take their route. It is now when you realize that this  project that may take well over a few years to finish.

The fact of the matter is, many people who live in Kips Bay have to suffer from the factors of noise pollution, and the cost of living in the neighborhood goes against what the comfort factor for the residents. Noise pollution, although loud in most areas in Manhattan, suffer in major parts in Kips Bay, specifically. The reason is due to the abundance of sport bars, meaning that there is excess noise not only during the weekends, but during major sporting events/games during the week. Tying this with the excessive number of hospitals in the neighborhood, police precincts, and fire houses, Kips Bay is a hot spot for noise pollution. When push comes to shove, many residents would have to question whether or not they would continue to live in a neighborhood with such high cost of living adjustment (COLA) and high rates of noise pollution.

American Girl

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What is the theme of Ta Nehisi-Coates”s profile? Is there an overarching narrative? What surprises Coates about Michelle Obama? How does Coates contextualize Michelle in the context of his own background growing up in Baltimore?

The theme of the profile was making the first lady, Michelle Obamas, life so relatable. The writer really focused on giving insight of how and where she grew up. The overarching narrative was focusing on the population and class that surrounded the neighborhood Mrs.Obama grew up in. The way she was able to grow up in a tough city and separate herself from the stereotypes. The writer seemed to be surprised she wasn’t a “mad black woman”, that she was actually nice and calm. In the very first sentence of the article we understand what the surprise is “The first time I saw Michelle Obama in the flesh, I almost took her for white”, she was completely opposite of what the writer expected.

Black and White

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In both Fox’s and Bagli’s pieces we see how the Stuyvesant town housing is inaccessible to different people.

In Bagli’s piece we are explained more about the prices of the apartments rising and how this forced out groups of people. These are the groups of people that the housing was meant for in the first place. It was originally a place where lower social class found themselves comfortable but due to the rent rising above an average of 4,000 an apartment, many of these original groups were forced out.

Fox’s piece touches on how Stuy town was originally meant for lower income families and war-veterans, but excluded black families. This was even though many war-veterans included blacks.

Both are about a social and economic struggle in the complex but Bagli focuses more on the current issues forcing out certain groups whereas Fox looks more into the past.

I live in Stuy town currently and notice that it is prevalently whites living there. The rent is high and theres no way I could have lived there if my parents did not have decent paying salaries.

Affordable Housing vs. Gentrification

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Dear Feature Writers,

Several of you have chosen the subject of Affordable Housing for your final Conflict Story project. Do read the editorial in today’s New York Times on the subject. Note the opposition from various neighborhood Community Boards:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/28/opinion/affordable-housing-vs-gentrification.html?ref=opinion&_r=0

Also worth reading: Priced Out, and Moving On about gentrification in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/29/nyregion/gentrification-in-a-brooklyn-neighborhood-forces-residents-to-move-on.html

RB

American Girl

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What is the theme of Ta Nehisi-Coates”s profile?

The theme of Ta Nehisi-Coates’s profile is about Michelle Obama’s past and how she grew up “rooted in her home, the South Side of Chicago”.

Is there an overarching narrative?

Well there seems to be an overarching narrative about the separation between the way Ta Nehisi-Coates grew up and Michelle Obama. He references a lot of his past in way that the readers can be able to relate too and is interesting enough to keep your attention.

What surprises Coates about Michelle Obama?

Ta Nehisi-Coates was surprised about Michelle Obama because she wasn’t an average angry black women he’s used to seeing. Growing up as a son of a radical Black Panther movement he must have been surrounded by female individuals who spoke from their heart. Much of which we can assume was about black oppression and white supremacy.

How does Coates contextualize Michelle in the context of his own background growing up in Baltimore?

Ta Nehisi-Coates’s background is built upon the idealistic that were impressed upon him as a child growing up within the Black Panthers. Especially during his college years in Howard referring, “It was the mid-’90s, and all of us sported some measure of black pride—be it Afrocentric or ghettocentric”, while Michelle Obama grew up in a black community. This idea of “blackness” growing up seems to spur Ta Nehisi-Coates’s inner soul while for Michelle Obama she didn’t have to face the same struggle.

American Girl

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What is the theme of Ta Nehisi-Coates’s profile?

I felt like the theme focused on a side of Michelle Obama that the public rarely gets a glimpse of. A lot of the profile went in depth as to where Michelle comes from in Chicago,  and how her childhood and earlier years influenced who she became and the choices she made later in life.

Is there an overarching narrative?

In general, this article goes more into depth about the black population in Chicago. Not only did the writer elaborate on Michelle’s life, but also on many other blue collar worker families in the area. Coates shows how the first lady’s story growing up is similar to the rest of those in that specific demographic.

What surprises Coates about Michelle Obama?

I think that what surprised Coates the most was how open Michelle was about her life growing up, and how she “says what she means,” she seemed very down to earth.

How does Coates contextualize Michelle in the context of his own background growing up in Baltimore?

In the context of his own background growing up, Coates states that Michelle was not that affected by the racial and economic issues going on in Chicago at the time. For example, he writes about her side of town held onto their economic income when Chicago was struggling, as well as how she was “surrounded by a cocoon.” From my perspective, it was almost as if Coates believed she was more fortunate than others around her, and because of this he “mistook her for white,” when he first met her.

American Girl

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What is the theme of Ta Nehisi-Coates’s profile?

Growing up black in her neighborhood and how it affected her. It shows how it shaped and made the person she is today. There also includes a history of the neighborhood.

Is there an overarching narrative?

Though the article speaks largely of Michelle Obama, it is also about all black residents of south side that grew up like Obama. It takes the idea that all black people grew up impoverished with both parents working and struggling and presents us with an alternative truth, black people growing up in “normal” homes, with a working father and stay at home mother. It presents us with a break in the stereotype.

What surprises Coates about Michelle Obama?

Coates says that “The first time I saw Michelle Obama in the flesh, I almost took her for white”.

How does Coates contextualize Michelle in the context of his own background growing up in Baltimore?

Michelle grew up not knowing what “blackness” was whereas Coates compares himself and knew very much of his “blackness”. He knew his “blackness” as his culture and to her i was not a culture she was familiar with or viewed it as. They had different perspective on life in their early upbringing.

 

American Girl

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What is the theme of Ta Nehisi-Coates”s profile?

The theme of Ta Nehisi- Coates’s profile represents Michelle Obama’s early years growing up in South Side and how that has shaped her as an American.

Is there an overarching narrative?

Yes. The overarching narrative addresses black separatism.

What surprises Coates about Michelle Obama?

Coates was surprised because instead of Obama building her speech on slave narratives or oppression, she spoke about her life as a child and how America has changed since then.

How does Coates contextualize Michelle in the context of his own background growing up in Baltimore?

Coates grew up in a segregated neighborhood whereas Obama grew up in an all black community; even though they lived in two different social cultures they both understood blackness as a minority in their adult life because they both stepped out of their community borders and experienced a world that was unrecognizable from the world they grew up in.

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What is the theme of Ta Nehisi-Coates’s profile?

The theme of Coates’ piece seems to be a general examination of the neighborhood Michelle Obama grew up in and the history thereof. It’s a look into how her upbringing has impacted the woman she is today.

Is there an overarching narrative?

There’s a narrative of a sort of egalitarian existence within Chicago–within her community, Obama was able to “forget” that she was black in the sense that she was not constantly told she was an “other.” Everyone around her looked just like her, so there was no sense of otherness till she stepped outside her community. This aspect of Obama’s early life, with a working father and stay at home mother, stands in contrast to many stereotypes about black families.

What surprises Coates about Michelle Obama?

Coates notes that he almost took Obama for white the first time he saw her, and was surprised at the ease and fondness with which she recalled her childhood and old neighborhood.

How does Coates contextualize Michelle in the context of his own background growing up in Baltimore?

Coates contrasts his early upbringing, where he was keenly aware of his blackness and of blackness as a culture, to Obama’s, who was only aware of this when she stepped into the outside world. Both had very different perspectives on themselves in early life.

American Girl

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Ta-Nehisi Coates begins his profile, American Girl, by saying “The first time I saw Michelle Obama in the flesh, I almost took her for white.” He later explains this is to be not because of her mannerisms, but because of her belief and support of a black community “fully vested” in their country. The piece focuses on the issue of race and the place of a working woman in American society through the retelling of Obama’s childhood. Coates admits he was surprised that Obama told her story of growing up in Chicago with extreme happiness as if it were picture perfect. Throughout history, African Americans were subject to extreme hardship and discrimination with bios playing on a “dream deferred.” He waited for “slave narratives and oppression… looking for justice and the plight of the poor” but instead Obama promotes the power of the modern woman with her “americanness” rooted in her hometown. Her neighborhood allowed her and other African Americans to be “Black and proud.” She, thus, bridges the gap between black America and all of America. Coates contextualizes Obama in the context of his own background in Baltimore by explaining that although he grew up in a segregated neighborhood, he never understood blackness as a minority until he was the only black man in a room of people who did not look or act like him. He knew he was black but never felt it because his own community had always surrounded him. Obama too, never looked at the world differently when she was a child. As a kid, she wasn’t directly aware of racism but as an adult she felt the segregation.