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WORK TITLE: How to Kill a City
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PSEUDONYM(S):
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CITY: Philadelphia
STATE: PA
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http://studyhall.xyz/peter-moskowitz/
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Male.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Author and journalist. Study Hall, co-founder.
WRITINGS
Contributor to periodicals, including Vice, New York Times, Guardian, and the New Republic. Also contributor to websites, including BuzzFeed, New York Magazine, Fusion, Wired, and Al Jazeera America.
SIDELIGHTS
Peter Moskowitz works primarily in journalism, and has contributed to a number of periodicals. His specialties include social issues, environmentalism, and how these two subjects frequently commingle with one another.
Moskowitz’s debut book, How to Kill a City: Gentrification, Inequality, and the Fight for the Neighborhood, relates heavily to Moskowitz’s chosen subjects. The book details Moskowitz’s personal examination of how gentrification affects and harms cities and their populations. “Gentrification” can be defined as the systematic process of pushing lower-income citizens out of a residential area, so it can be renovated and marketed to potential higher-income citizens. With nowhere else to go, many of these lower-income citizens are forced to either leave their homes and seek shelter elsewhere, or remain where they are while dealing with an increased cost of living they do not have the money for.
Moskowitz witnessed these effects personally throughout an extended period of travel, where he talked to citizens and conducted research on the issue. Moskowitz specifically investigated the effects of gentrification throughout Detroit, MI; San Francisco, CA; New York, NY; and New Orleans, LA. In the process, Moskowitz identifies many common themes and occurrences within gentrified cities, as well as how damaged the people displaced by gentrification can become. He also debriefs readers on the histories of each area he visits, explaining what led up to their gentrification. In the case of Detroit, an economic collapse led to the residential areas being gentrified toward higher-income citizens with the hope of the city’s economy being rebuilt by wealthier potential residents. On the other hand, New Orleans’s gentrification came about due to the devastation left behind by Hurricane Katrina. With their homes destroyed beyond repair, many lower-income citizens of the city were forced to find new homes. The city’s government took the devastation as a new chance to shape the city into something new. Race and socioeconomic class become intertwined within the book, as it is often people of color pushed from their homes by gentrification in favor of wealthier, white citizens. Towards the end of the book, Moskowitz uses his research to try and help those dealing with gentrification fight back. A Library Journal contributor expressed that the book will prove “relevant to anyone who values diverse cityscapes and socioeconomic justice.” In an issue of Kirkus Reviews, one reviewer called the book “[a] harsh critic of the forces changing urban life paints a vivid and grim picture of the future of American cities.” A writer in Internet Bookwatch expressed that How To Kill a City should be “highly recommended.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Internet Bookwatch, April, 2017, review of How To Kill a City: Gentrification, Inequality, and the Fight for the Neighborhood.
Kirkus Reviews, December 15, 2016, review of How To Kill a City.
Library Journal, February 1, 2017, “Changing Cityscapes Revolutions,” review of How To Kill a City, p. 93.
Publishers Weekly, December 12, 2016, review of How To Kill a City, p. 136.
ONLINE
Study Hall, http://studyhall.xyz/ (October 17, 2017), author profile.
// Peter Moskowitz //
I'm a journalist and writer based in Philadelphia. My work focuses on the intersection of the environment (both built and natural) and human lives. I also write essays about issues that are important to me (mainly social justice and LGBTQ rights).
My book How to Kill a City, a narrative journey through gentrification in four U.S. cities, is available for sale. My publisher is Nation Books/Perseus/Hachette (the book imprint of The Nation magazine).
My work has appeared in The New York Times, The New Republic, The Guardian, New York Magazine (online), Al Jazeera America, Wired, Fusion, BuzzFeed, Vice and many other places. I co-founded Study Hall, a coworking space for non-fiction writers, in the fall of 2015 with a mission to build community within the freelance world.
My email is peter.moskowitz@gmail.com.
Changing Cityscapes Revolutions
Library Journal. 142.2 (Feb. 1, 2017): p93.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.libraryjournal.com/
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Moskowitz, Peter. How To Kill a City: Gentrification, Inequality, and the Fight for the Neighborhood. Nation. Mar. 2017. 272p. notes, index. ISBN 9781568585239. $26.99; ebk. ISBN 9781568585246. S0C SCI
Journalist Moskowitz visits four gentrifying American cities, where revitalization and displacement go hand in hand. Real estate developers buy old apartments and local businesses, city managers deal out rezoning and tax incentives to outsiders, and trendy millennials flock to San Francisco, New Orleans, New York, Detroit, and other gentrifying downtowns. Gentrification causes rents to skyrocket and locals--mostly low-income residents--to be displaced to the suburbs. Moskowitz exposes gentrification as systemic violence against low-income minorities that is rooted in historical inequalities and spearheaded by paternalistic developers and city officials who insist that displacement is the price of progress. The upshot is a "new geography of inequality." Moskowitz laments the decline of gritty urban communities and cultures, as well as the rise of inner cities that he characterizes as bland, affluent, and hipsteresque. He also touches on the growing global phenomenon in cities such as Berlin and London. This is a valuable entry text for deeper analyses found in Matthew Desmond's Evicted and Neil Smith's The New Urban Frontier. VERDICT A forceful critique of gentrification and its impact on disempowered members of American society. Relevant to anyone who values diverse cityscapes and socioeconomic justice.--Michael Rodriguez, Univ. of Connecticut
Moskowitz, Peter: HOW TO KILL A CITY
Kirkus Reviews. (Dec. 15, 2016):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
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Moskowitz, Peter HOW TO KILL A CITY Nation Books/Perseus (Adult Nonfiction) $26.99 3, 7 ISBN: 978-1-56858-523-9
A freelance journalist reveals the many evils of gentrification. Moskowitz, a former staff writer for Al Jazeera America, pulls no punches in his depiction of gentrification as "a void in a neighborhood, in a city, in a culture...a trauma, one caused by the influx of massive amounts of capital into a city and the consequent destruction following in its wake." The author takes as his examples the cities of New Orleans, Detroit, San Francisco, and New York, places where he sees gentrification not as a product of cultural and consumer choices but as the result of specific policies by politicians, urban planners, real estate firms, and heads of corporations. These policies are often unfavorable to the poor, benefitting the accumulation of capital by the rich. In New Orleans, writes Moskowitz, Hurricane Katrina gave politicians the opportunity to re-create it as a whiter, richer city, as did the near-bankruptcy of New York City and the bankruptcy of Detroit--at least in its downtown and midtown areas. In San Francisco, the author describes the rapidly rising rents that are forcing working-class people out as the mayor courts technology firms to come in. Moskowitz chronicles his visits to each city, telling the stories of individuals affected by gentrification and in some cases fighting against it. New York is a special case, for there, his home city, the author sees himself as both a gentrifier in his changing Brooklyn neighborhood and as a victim of the earlier gentrification of the West Village, where he grew up. In the final chapter, Moskowitz draws on the work of academics and activists to present a list of six tactics for resisting gentrification, but ultimately, he asserts, there will be no solution without much greater economic and racial equality. A harsh critic of the forces changing urban life paints a vivid and grim picture of the future of American cities.
How to Kill a City: Gentrification, Inequality, and the Fight for the Neighborhood
Publishers Weekly. 263.51 (Dec. 12, 2016): p136.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
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How to Kill a City: Gentrification, Inequality, and the Fight for the Neighborhood
Peter Moskowitz. Nation, $26.99 (272p)
ISBN 978-1-56858-523-9
Journalist Moskowitz's first book is ambitious but also cluttered and lacking in depth. The book begins by suggesting that gentrification is a misunderstood buzzword. Moskowitz discusses the stages cities go through before gentrification is complete, beginning with policy and planning long before the coffee shops and art galleries show up. Examining the phenomenon through four cities (Detroit, New Orleans, New York, and San Francisco) should broaden the scope of the book, but the chapters are too brief and none of the cities is afforded enough time. Moskowitz asserts that current urban planning trends don't favor residents, noting how the populations of two radically transformed cities, Detroit and New Orleans, have declined. The book has too many threads that are not given enough room to unspool, such as the reverse "white flight" back into cities. There are many compelling beginnings, but the book reads like a summary; it's a retread of information for knowledgeable readers and a superficial introduction for novices. (Mar.)
How to Kill a City
Internet Bookwatch. (Apr. 2017):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Midwest Book Review
http://www.midwestbookreview.com
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How to Kill a City
Peter Moskowitz
Nation Books
c/o Perseus Book Group
250 W. 57th St., Suite 1500, New York, NY 10107
9781568585239 $26.99 www.nationbooks.org
Gentrification is the process by which an influx of affluent residents drives up the value of a city's property. This often has the unfortunate side effect of forcing working-class community residents to move out because they can no longer afford to pay skyrocketing rents or property taxes. How to Kill a City: Gentrification, Inequality, and the Fight for the Neighborhood is a scathing criticism of the negative effects gentrification has had on American cities, with case studies of New Orleans, Detroit, San Francisco, and New York. Attracting wealthy residents to Detroit may seem beneficial at first glance, but when a sizeable portion of Detroit's cash-strapped budget is spent subsidizing its most well-off residents (in the form of tax breaks and other financial incentives) while the poor and working-class struggle to pay astronomically high water bills, something is clearly amiss and unjust. Freelance journalist Peter Moskowitz explores the role that race and class have played in gentrification, and predicts a bleak future if nothing is done to mitigate current trends. What will happen to American society as more and more impoverished people are forced to move to the suburbs, which have fewer social services, no public transportation, and a decided lack of employment opportunities for anyone who can't afford to own a car? Notes and an index round out this persuasive case for more public involvement in city government, a national rent regulation law, and more protection of public lands (among other suggested measures) before America's cities become the primary domain of capital instead of people. Highly recommended.