Space and Place: Urban Frontiers of the 21st Century
Kendall Cram Room, University Center
4:00 p.m.
Accelerating globalization, population movements, territorial struggles, technological change, and uneven economic development continually shape and re-shape physical and social landscapes. These trends transform human experience and cultural representations of both progress and decline. In the early 21st century this complex dynamic finds clearest expression in the world’s urban centers. The 2002 Tulane University Presidential Symposium “Space And Place: Urban Frontiers Of The 21st Century” is designed to bring together some of the world’s foremost scholars of urbanism to consider the trajectory, implications, and dilemmas of urban life, and, perhaps, plot a future course.
Speakers and Topics
Scott S. Cowen: President, Tulane University
“Welcome to the Urban Planning Symposium ”
Scott Cowen is the 14th president of Tulane University. He has established the series of Presidential Symposia as part of Tulane’s ongoing effort to share the expertise of the program’s faculty with members of the campus community and the greater New Orleans community.
Lawrence Powell: Executive Director, Tulane/Xavier National Center for the Urban Community
Moderator
Lawrence Powell is the executive director of the Tulane/Xavier National Center for the Urban Community. A professor and researcher of Southern history, race relations and Holocaust studies, Powell was vice chair and a founding member of the Louisiana Coalition Against Racism and Nazism and a board member of the Amistad Research Center. He was recognized in 1999 as the Louisiana Humanist of the Year by the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities.
Todd Boyd: Associate Professor, University of Southern California, School of Cinema-Television
Topic: “The New HNIC: The Death of Civil Rights and the Reign of Hip Hop”
Ph.D., University of Iowa, 1991
Todd Boyd, associate professor in the School of Cinema-Television at the University of Southern California, is an internationally recognized expert on film and popular culture. Boyd, who is a member of USC’s “Brain Trust,” an elite group of the university’s most prominent professors, is the author of the critically acclaimed Am I Black Enough For You? Popular Culture from the ’Hood and Beyond, which has been described by cultural critic Michael Eric Dyson as “one of the most important and insightful books yet written on Black popular culture.” Boyd was a producer and co-writer on the Paramount Pictures film The Wood, one of the most profitable Hollywood movies of 1999. His expert commentary in this regard has appeared in the New York Times, The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Time, Newsweek and U.S. News and World Report.
Michael Dear: Professor of Geography and Director, Southern California Studies Center, University of Southern California
Topic: “Learning from Los Angeles”
Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania, 1974
Michael Dear, professor of geography and founding director of the Southern California Studies Center at the University of Southern California, is among the most-cited authorities in geography and author and/or editor of 10 books and more than 100 journal articles and reports. His most recent works, Postmodern Urbanism and The Service Hub Concept in Human Service Planning are forthcoming, and an edited collection, Rethinking Los Angeles, was published by Sage Publications in 1996. Dear was a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford in 1995-96, and held a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1989. He received honors from the Association of American Geographers in 1995 and, in the same year, received the University of Southern California’s Associates Award for highest honors for creativity in research, teaching and service.
Myron Orfield: Minnesota State Senator; President, Ameregis; Adjunct Professor, University of Minnesota Law School
Topic: “American Metropolitics: The New Suburban Reality”
J.D., University of Chicago Law School, 1987
Myron Orfield, Minnesota state senator, president of Ameregis and adjunct professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, has become a nationally recognized expert in the area of metropolitan planning and policymaking. Orfield’s book, Metropolitics: A Regional Agenda for Community and Stability, redefined the field of regional studies. His latest work, American Metropolitics: The New Suburban Reality, provides an analysis of the economic, racial, environmental and political trends of the 25 largest metropolitan regions in the United States. Before joining the state senate, Orfield served five terms in the Minnesota House of Representatives. He has authored legislation for reforming land-use and fiscal-equity laws in the Twin Cities area. As president of Ameregis, a research and geographic information system firm, Orfield is working on more than 40 studies of regional development throughout the United States and Canada. His research has been featured in The Wall Street Journal and USA Today, as well as ABC News’ “Nightline,” and National Public Radio’s “Talk of the Nation” and “Morning Edition.”
Daphne Spain: Professor of Urban and Environmental Planning, School of Architecture, University of Virginia
Topic: “Approaching the Incessant City”
Ph.D. in Sociology, University of Massachusetts, 1977
Daphne Spain, professor of urban and environmental planning at the University of Virginia’s School of Architecture, worked as a statistician at the United States Bureau of the Census and as a freelance writer before joining the planning faculty. Spain’s publications include Back to the City: Issues in Neighborhood Renovation and Gendered Spaces, as well as articles on housing and neighborhoods in the Journal of the American Planning Association, The Journal of Planning Literature and The Journal of Urban Affairs. Her most recent book is Balancing Act: Motherhood, Marriage, and Employment Among American Women. Spain’s forthcoming book, How Women Saved the City, explores the “redemptive” urban places built by women at the turn of the century through voluntary associations. She has been elected to the Board of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning (ACSP).