Please join us for a “What I Am Thinking About Now” presentation by Anthony Pratcher II, Postdoctoral Research Associate in Race and Ethnicity, CSREA and the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, Brown University.

“The Colored Metropolis: Race, Housing, and Metropolitan Development”
Urban scholars of all stripes have struggled to agree on a workable definition for racial integration in metropolitan communities. In many cases, racial integration exists as a transient state—a moment in time between demographic transformation. Using ArcGIS to spatially represent demographic data, this paper demonstrates the value of a self-referential formula to identify racial integration in metropolitan space. Using census data from 1970 until 2010, this paper advances a system which determines, in relation to other census tracts, where there are zones of relative racial integration within one metropolitan area. This approach, opposed to identifying census tracts which met specific quantitative criteria, through the treatment of racial integration as a qualitative variable, shows how local economic conditions allow racial integration to co-exist with rising social segregation. In conclusion, this paper provides a method to quantify racial integration as part of metropolitan growth across space and time.

RSVP: [email protected]. Snacks and caffeine will be provided.

“What I Am Thinking About Now” is an on-going informal workshop/seminar series to which faculty and graduate students are invited to present and discuss recently published work and work in progress. All are invited to attend and participate.