CITIES AND SUBURBS

SOCIOLOGY 125

SPRING 2001

Prof. Robert J. S. ABob@ Ross

[35% of grade]

INSTRUCTIONS

Answer three questions. Please keep the total of your answer to a maximum of 9 double-spaced, typed or word-processed pages (not counting references or tables).

Please don't be clever and use little type and super-wide pages. This hurts our eyes. Please don't give me the very last pages the ink cartridge could produce before it went totally invisible: this too hurts my eyes. Test your printer before the deadline for this assignment!

Type the whole text of the question you are answering at the top of your answer. Attach and sign the check list.

NOTE ON COLLABORATION: You may consult any person or source. You must cite all sources for data with formal reference format.

Citations to texts or electronic sources should be formal and full. See any sociology journal for the citation system you choose, and consult the handout on ASA style. This counts.

Plagiarism: includes quoting without quotation marks; using close paraphrases without referencing the source. Copying another persons’ work. Use caution.

DUE: May 7 (4^th for Seniors), in Room 401 Jeff (Sociology Department office). Look for a Box that says “Soc. 125 IN”

Question 1.

What role does racial segregation play in perpetuating high rates of poverty among African –Americans?

Question 2.

More than half of the metropolitan population of the country lives in areas officially designated as suburban. How are suburban residents different on average from other metropolitan residents? How does this provoke different political policy preferences among suburban as contrasted to central residents? What interests do they share?

Question 3.

You are the chief urban affairs adviser to the next President. Before you can figure out what is politically possible, you need to know what, in the best of all possible worlds, you'd like him to do. You review your urban sociology notes for ideas about urban problems and federal policies that will make urban life better. You develop a memo with the three most important actions, explaining why they are important and how they will make things better -- and for whom. Submit the memo.

Question 4.

Someone once argued that the car killed the central city; they are not dead, so he can’t be completely correct. Some cities, however, are on life support -- they are economically weak, socially distressed, and physically decrepit. Explain the role that automobiles – and the transportation and housing choices that catered to them – played in the decline of central cities.

Question 5

Consider these two images of the American city and American society: “The Lonely Crowd” (David Reisman) and the “Urban Village.” (Herbert Gans) Show the relation of each to the history of urban theory. Assess the relative accuracy of both.

Sociology 125

Spring 2001

Essay Checklist

Before submitting your paper, complete the following tasks. Check them off, sign the sheet and staple it to the front of your paper. No paper will be graded without a completed checklist.

I, ___________________________________, have competed the following tasks before submitting my essay:

r Revised my draft.

r Used a spell check program AND proof read carefully.

r Used correct citation form within text and

r Used Correct bibliographic form

r Stapled all essay pages and this cover sheet together.

r Numbered all pages of my essay.

r Kept a paper and an electronic copy of my essay.

r Included a title page with my name, course title and date and title of this assignment.

r Typed the text of the question to be answered at the top of the page on which the answer begins.

Signature

_______________________ Date