Breast Cancer as an Ethnic Variable
October 28, 2009 at 4:27 pm | In breast cancer, health, neighborhoods, race | Leave a Comment
Over time, the number of women dying from breast cancer has decreased. While there is no cure, early detection, mammography, and treatment have made breast cancer survivable. A diagnosis is no longer a death sentence—though that edict may not ring true for all.
Although breast cancer prevalence is higher in Chicago’s White female population, mortality rates of Black women are significantly higher. In light of research on the topic in 2005, WBEZ’s Gabriel Spitzer spoke to survivors and surgeons, experts and advocates, to bring us the series, Twice as Deadly: Chicago’s Race Gap in Breast Cancer Survival.
While some cite genetic predisposition, Steven Whitman’s (Sinai Urban Health Institute) research links the disease to Chicago’s social fabric. Whitman’s research argues that Black women have less access to screening and treatment, the very things that make breast cancer beatable.
African American women seek mammograms at lower rates and are diagnosed in later stages, significantly decreasing their chances for survival. Additionally, facilities providing mammograms in largely-Black neighborhoods are rare. Those in existence are expensive, and their machines are often old or broken.
It’s a domino effect of barriers:
Black women die from breast cancer at high rates…
Because they don’t catch their cancer in the early stages…
Because they don’t get mammograms…
Because they can’t afford the costs of the procedure or transportation to facilities offering free services is inconvenient…
Because they have low incomes.
We are aware how variable economic, social, and geographical barriers impact health, but access and quality should not be rogue variables.
Toronto researcher finds strong patterns of personality traits across neighborhoods
October 27, 2009 at 4:35 pm | In creative class, data, neighborhoods, personality, what to read | Leave a Comment
Are Chicago’s South Siders more agreeable than their North Side neighbors? In which neighborhoods are Chicagoans most open to new experiences? University of Toronto’s Kevin Stolarick has taken personality data from a study of more than 2,500 Chicagoans who took “The Big Five Personality Test” and mapped the data onto Chicago neighborhoods. The data reveal strong patterns across neighborhoods. For example, people who see themselves as extroverted appear to cluster on the South Side; those with higher neurotic scores, on the far North Side. Stolarick works in Richard Florida’s Martin Prosperity Institute, which has seen controversy in recent months. See articles Chicago Tribune and Chicago Redeye.
Chicago’s Mixed-income Housing begins its 11th Year
October 6, 2009 at 4:14 pm | In cities, economic development, housing, neighborhoods, poverty | Leave a CommentTerry Peterson’s legacy with the Chicago Housing Authority may very well lie in his efforts to create viable mixed-income housing. However, the plan has experienced numerous setbacks since its inception. Although the first ten years saw the demise of some of the country’s most notorious complexes, such as Cabrini Green and the Robert Taylor Homes, many of the latest setbacks arrived with the economic downturn. Other issues are more ideological in nature. Ideally, the new mixed-income communities promote cross-class socioeconomic unity while providing access to those citizens traditionally outside the realm of top-notch resources. Chicago Public Radio examined this issue further. The story can be found here.
UrbanOrgs member Scott Allard discusses latest poverty figures on Chicago Public Radio
September 30, 2009 at 11:44 am | In Uncategorized | Leave a CommentThe following story was featured on Chicago Public Radio on September 29, 2009:
Poverty Levels Are Expected to Rise in 2009
The number of Illinois residents living in poverty grew by about a quarter million from 2000 to 2008. That’s according to new data released by the U.S. Census Bureau, today.
12.2 percent of Illinoisans and almost 15 percent of Cook County residents were living in poverty in 2008. Scott Allard is professor at the University of Chicago’s school of social service administration. He says he doesn’t expect the poverty level to decline for another few years.
ALLARD: There’s a lot of people who aren’t going to be going back to work anytime soon. And that even though some economic indicators are showing that we’re emerging out of recession, many people are not getting called back to work, or their lost earnings aren’t being replaced.
Allard says the current recession and the economic downturn earlier in the decade contribute to higher rates of poverty around the country. He says poverty is hitting more families and people living in suburban areas.
According to 2009 federal guidelines, a household of four with an annual income below $22,050 is considered to be living in poverty.
For an audio version, visit
http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Content.aspx?audioID=37095
Katherine Chen publishes book on Burning Man organization
September 28, 2009 at 5:47 pm | In Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
Researchers interested in how urban organizations emerge, recruit members, secure resources, learn management strategies, and establish collaborations may find numerous lessons from a study of an organization whose members meet yearly in the middle of a Nevada desert. From the publisher: “In the summer of 2008, nearly fifty thousand people traveled to Nevada’s Black Rock Desert to participate in the countercultural arts event Burning Man. Founded on a commitment to expression and community, the annual weeklong festival presents unique challenges to its organizers. Over four years Katherine K. Chen regularly participated in organizing efforts to safely and successfully create a temporary community in the middle of the desert under the hot August sun. Enabling Creative Chaos tracks how a small, underfunded group of organizers transformed into an unconventional corporation with a ten-million-dollar budget and two thousand volunteers. Over the years, Burning Man’s organizers have experimented with different management models; learned how to recruit, motivate, and retain volunteers; and developed strategies to handle regulatory agencies and respond to media coverage. This remarkable evolution, Chen reveals, offers important lessons for managers in any organization, particularly in uncertain times.” Chen volunteered with and studied the organization for four years.
The costs of calulating poverty
September 14, 2009 at 12:35 pm | In NYT, news, poverty | Leave a CommentTags: New York City, poverty, welfare
If you’re raising a family of four on $26K, you may believe that your current checkbook balance is enough to qualify your household for federal assistance. And in New York, at least, you’d be right. Beginning with recommendations provided by the National Academy of Sciences, NYC set out to reform their decades-old guidelines by issuing new measures of poverty based on 2006 census data. The new calculations go a step further than traditional measures, considering living expenses such as healthcare and childcare costs. The result, according to backers of the new formula, is a more realistic picture of today’s world. They’re pushing the federal government to make a similar change.
To read the full article and listen to the story on National Public Radio, please click here.
To see the working paper on which this story was based, click here.
Michael McQuarrie and Nicole Marwell publish new paper on “The Missing Organizational Dimension in Urban Sociology”
August 22, 2009 at 9:14 am | In reading list, what to read | Leave a CommentUrbanOrgs members Michael McQuarrie and Nicole Marwell have a new paper coming out in the September issue of the journal City and Community. The paper, “The Missing Organizational Dimension in Urban Sociology,” takes issue with the treatment of organizations in much urban sociology. The authors argue that both Marxian political economists and Chicagoan ethnographers and quantitative analysts treat organizations as derivative rather than productive of urban social relations. McQuarrie and Marwell do not see this problem as epistemological or methodological. Instead, they argue that it is rooted in the objects of analysis that urban sociologists choose. Drawing on key elements of structuration theory, these scholars attempt to lay the groundwork for improving the treatment of organizations in urban sociology by flagging some of the key insights in the sociology of organizations. They do not view this intellectual borrowing as a one-way street and emphasize that urbanists have a contribution to make to sociological thinking about organizations. Correcting these problems, the authors point out, is essential if we are to understand the link between contemporary institutional transformations and urban neighborhoods. The article appears in the September 2009 issue of City and Community (Volume 8, Issue 3).
An institutional problem in Boston area police departments?
July 31, 2009 at 10:35 am | In police, prison system, race | Leave a CommentJust as the controversy over the arrest of black scholar Herny L. Gates at his Cambridge home by a white police officer appeared to be nearing an end, a Boston police officer has written a letter to the Boston Globe comparing Gates (multiple times) to a “jungle monkey”: “If I was the officer he verbally assaulted like a banana-eating jungle monkey, I would have sprayed him in the face with OC deserving of his belligerent non-compliance. “ Officer Justin Barrett has been suspended; he insists he is not a racist. (Barrett’s lawyer explains that his client’s comparison would have been “much less offensive, if [his client had] used a different species of animal.” [!]) Mayor Menino wants him fired. Watch the NECN report, via boston.com. Is this a free speech issue? Is it evidence of an institutional problem in Boston area police departments? As the Boston Globe reports, detective Larry Ellison, president of the Massachusetts Association of Minority Law Enforcement Officers, points to multiple incidents, including that of a white officer who posted an article, “Slavery: Best Thing that Ever Happened to Blacks.” For more on police department culture, see the blog of sociologist and police officer Peter Moskos .
Group emerges to oppose “creative class” movement in Toronto
July 23, 2009 at 3:19 pm | In amenities, cities, creative class, economic development | 3 CommentsThe Toronto Star reports that an activist group, Creative Class Struggle, has emerged to oppose the influence of Richard Florida and the Martin Prosperity Institute, a think-tank at the University of Toronto. Florida is known for arguing that today’s cities will prosper to the extent they can attract artists, engineers, intellectuals, and other professionals who constitute what he terms the “creative class.” Members of this class are attracted by tolerant environments and a plethora of ammenities, such as cafes, galeries, and restaurants. The activist group complains that Florida’s model ignores that these “glorified professionals” are “supported by an invisible army of low-wage service workers.”
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