Previous to Challenge Detroit, I spent a lot of time thinking about Detroit, and now that my actual job employs me to think about Detroit —-well, it\u2019s a lot of thinking about this fine city. This blog post is an informal invitation to my thoughts….<\/p>\n
One of my more recent thoughts was spawned by this phrase I feel like I continuously overhear around Metro Detroit: \u201cgood area.\u201d Almost always, this phrase is used to reference a not so \u201cgood area\u201d within the city limits. Sentences overheard sound something like this:<\/p>\n
\u201cWe went to X place but it\u2019s not really in a good area\u201d and\/or \u201cOh! Is X in a good area?\u201d and\/or \u201cWe had to drive through a really bad area to get there.\u201d ETC ETC.<\/p>\n
Now to be fair, I am by no means excused from this type of language. In fact, one of the reasons I\u2019ve been thinking about this phrase is because I do indeed catch myself using it often. So, in order to unpack the use of this phrase, here are some things I am considering:<\/p>\n
1. What makes a place good versus bad?<\/p>\n
2. What makes a neighborhood good versus bad?<\/p>\n
3. How does the use of these dichotomies effect our engagement with Detroit places\/ neighborhoods\/people?<\/p>\n
4. How does our language affect our understanding of Detroit?<\/p>\n
Wow! That\u2019s a lot to consider! I certainly won\u2019t be able to provide adequate analysis of each of these questions in this short space, but I think it\u2019s really important for each of us (Detroiter or not) to really sit with these questions. Here are some of my quick thoughts on these considerations:<\/p>\n
1. What makes a place good versus bad?<\/p>\n
Comfort, comfort, comfort is good. Maybe this means knowing a person at this place, or knowing anyone that has been to this place before. It could also mean feeling welcomed and invited into this place, plus feeling safe.<\/p>\n
So how do we create comfort in places?<\/em><\/p>\n 2. What makes a neighborhood good versus bad?<\/p>\n Similar to place, a personal connection to a neighborhood probably validates a feeling of comfort and safety, which is definitely good. Occupied houses and buildings, lit street lamps, working stoplights usually mean more safety and that\u2019s good too.<\/p>\n Will making Detroit neighborhoods safer make them good?<\/em><\/p>\n 3. How does the use of these dichotomies effect our engagement with Detroit places\/neighborhoods\/people?<\/p>\n We go to good places, we avoid bad places. We drive our cars rather than walk, bike or use public transportation so that we can feel safer when moving through bad places to good places.<\/p>\n How can we balance the realities of these descriptions with our perceived realities of Detroit?<\/em><\/p>\n 4. How does our language affect our understanding of Detroit?<\/p>\n I believe language tells our story. If we are going to tell the story of Detroit (or any city!), we should tell the true story and use real, authentic words to do this.<\/p>\n So are places and neighborhoods as simple as good versus bad?<\/em><\/p>\n Double wow! That\u2019s even more to consider. Each of these questions has inevitably led me to more questions on\u00a0my regular quest to understand the complexities of this very unique city. The thing is, I\u2019m really passionate about trying to more fully understand our perceptions of this city and I think if we can unpack those more thoroughly, we (all of us\u2014fellows, friends, family alike!) can more effectively make positive impacts for the city\u2019s future.<\/p>\n So instead of leaving you with a conclusive solution to these wonderings, I challenge you to delve deeper into how you tell the real story of Detroit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Previous to Challenge Detroit, I spent a lot of time thinking about Detroit, and now that my actual job employs me to think about Detroit —-well, it\u2019s a lot of thinking about this fine city. This blog post is an informal invitation to my thoughts…. One of my more recent thoughts was spawned by this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":252,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12494","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/252"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12494"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12494\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}