The Oxford Handbook of the Modern Slum (OXFORD HANDBOOKS SERIES)

""Slum" is among the most evocative and judgmental words of the modern world. It originated in the slang language of the world's then-largest city, London, early in the nineteenth century. Its use thereafter proliferated, and its original meanings unraveled as colonialism and urbanization transformed the world, and as prejudice against those disadvantaged by these transformations became entrenched. Cuckoo-like, "slum" overtook and transformed other local idioms: for example, bustee, favela, kampong, shack. "Slum" once justified heavy-handed redevelopment schemes that tore apart poor but viable neighborhoods. Now it underpins schemes of neighbourhood renewal that, seemingly benign in their intentions, nonetheless pay scant respect to the viewpoints of their inhabitants. This Oxford Handbook probes both present-day understandings of slums and their historical antecedents. It discusses the evolution of slum "improvement" policies globally from the early nineteenth century to the early twenty-first century. It encompasses multiple perspectives: anthropology, archaeology, architecture, geography, history, politics, sociology, urban studies and urban planning. It emphasizes the influences of gender and race inequality, and the persistence of subaltern agency notwithstanding entrenched prejudice and unsympathetically-applied institutionalized power. Uniquely, it balances contributions from scholars who deny the legitimacy of "slum" in social and policy analysis, with those who accept its relevance as a measuring stick of social disadvantage and as a vehicle for social reform. This Handbook does not simply footnote the past; it critiques conventional understandings of urban social disadvantage and reform across time and place in the modern world. It suggests pathways for future research and for alleviative reform"-- Provided by publisher The modern slum is as prevalent as its stereotypes. Today, a slum is often understood to be a place of extreme poverty in the developing world-a place disordered, lacking the basic amenities of life, traumatized by violence, and perpetuated by dysfunctional families and disaffected extremists. Yet the word “slum” was not coined in the twenty-first century's developing world or its recent past. The word emerged in early nineteenth-century London, and its use expanded as modernization created what is now the developed world and its client territories. The Oxford Handbook of the Modern Slum explores the history of the modern slum, connecting nineteenth-century iterations through multiple pathways to its contemporary existence. With chapters by more than twenty scholars, this Handbook brings an array of important and original perspectives and methodologies to bear on slums, real and imagined. Its analysis ranges across Europe, North America, Latin America, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Australia, and sub-Saharan Africa. The Handbook probes the impact of gender and race on urban social disadvantage and traces the development of private and state-sponsored intervention-as well as tourist interest-in urban poverty. It suggests that characterizations of slumland disequilibrium, dysfunctionality, and unsustainability should be offset by evidence of make-do enterprise, strategic determination, resilience, homeliness, and neighborliness. Drawing upon anthropology, archaeology, architecture, geography, history, politics, sociology and urban planning, the Handbook delves into households and communities whose existence has been hidden by stereotypes.