Negotiating Grit and Glamour: Young Women of Color and the Gentrification of the Lower East Side

Abstract

This paper examines experiences of gentrification from the perspective of young working class women of color who have grown up on the Lower East Side of New York City in the 1980s and 90s. In a participatory action research project entitled “Makes Me Mad: Stereotypes of young urban womyn of color”, six young women researchers investigate the relationship between the gentrification of their community, public (mis)representations, and their self‐understanding. Focusing on how young women negotiate processes of disinvestment and gentrification, this paper offers insights into how globalization is worked out on the ground and in their everyday lives. Bridging the material and psychological, I explore the socio‐spatial constitution of young women's identities as they interpret their experiences growing up on the Lower East Side having to live up both to the grittyness of ghetto life and the glamour of the club, café and boutique life. Drawing connections between the white‐washing sweep of gentrification, and socioeconomic disinvestment of their community, the women express a nuanced understanding of neighborhood change. I maintain that we can learn about the contradictions of globalization from these young women's ambivalent relationship with neighborhood change.