There Went the Neighborhood: Spatial Rhetoric, Spatial Occupation, Regendering and Forgetting in Mid-Century Detroit

Abstract

This essay shows the rhetorical and material process of regendering and forgetting that accompanied the downsizing and tearing down of U.S. progressive-era settlement homes founded by female maternalists who lost their ethos by mid-century in the U.S. The regendering of place by mid-century urban renewalist’s rhetoric, policy and culture enabled the elimination of neighborhoods. It made vulnerable the concept and material space of the neighborhood as a headquarters for community engagement, and denied the emotional attachment to homes that Progressive-Era maternalists embraced. The legacy of maternalist placemaking layered into Detroit’s contemporary social service agencies embodies the impact of this regendering.