Building

The Frontier Myth

(Class Struggle on Avenue B - The Lower East Side as Wild Wild West)
Neil Smith

Fritz Sihombing
Outline
Introduction
Observation & Problem Identification
Discussion
Introduction
The article written in English, by the late Professor Neil Smith
in 1996 in USA and published by Routledge in 1996.
Building The Frontier Myth is a section from an article Class
Struggle on Avenue B; The Lower East Side as Wild Wild West.
Its included on the book The New Urban Frontier;
Gentrification and the revanchist city.
The section discuss on how rhetorics plays role on gentrification
process, on the context of business communication, i.e.,
marketing.
Introduction
Neil Robert Smith (18 June 1954 29 September 2012) was a Scottish
geographer and academic.
He was Distinguished Professor of Anthropology and Geography at the
Graduate Center of the City University of New York.
Smith's research explored the broad intersections between space, nature,
social theory, and history.
Smith is credited with convincing theories about the gentrification of the
inner city as an economic process propelled by urban land prices and city
land speculation, rather than by cultural preferences for living in the city.
"Toward a Theory of Gentrification: A Back to the City Movement by
Capital, not People" (1979) has been cited over 300 times.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Smith_(geographer)
Observation & Problem Identification
Historical context:
The Tompkins Square Park Riot on August 67, 1988.
Government supported gentrification of Lower East Side (LES).
Social context:
Developers marketing strategies for promoting the gentrified
area.
Frontier Myth was a widely use rhetoric, to encourage middle
class to move to LES.
Observation & Problem Identification
Studies on gentrification of LES
Smith compares the gentrification of New York City to the
Frontier Myth or Taming the Wild West
Represent the attitudes of the residents of New York City
who move to LES
Viewing themselves as pioneers, the first settlers who
started the transformation of LES neighborhoods
Observation & Problem Identification
Frontier Myth
The frontier myth or myth of the West is a term given to
the popular romanticization of the Wild West frontier.
In the United States, the frontier was the term applied to
the zone of unsettled land outside the region of existing
settlements of Americans.
In a broad sense, the notion of the frontier was the edge of
the settled country where unlimited free land was available
and thus unlimited opportunity.
Observation & Problem Identification
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Frontier Myth semiotic studies
Smith compares many New York City neighborhoods, in
particular Soho and the LES, to the Western frontier and
the jungles of Africa
Gentrification of the LES can be compared to the discovery
of the Wild West.
The frontier ideology impacted the fashion and style of
many of the high-end boutiques in Soho.
Observation & Problem Identification
Observation & Problem Identification
Ludlow Street. No one we know would think of living here. No one
we know has ever heard of Ludlow Street. Maybe someday this
neighborhood will be the way the Village was before we knew
anything about New York. We explain that moving down here is a
kind of urban pioneering, and tell [Mother] she should be proud. We
liken our crossing Houston Street to pioneers crossing the Rockies.

New Yorker (Ludlow Street, 1988)

Observation & Problem Identification
The trailblazers have done their work: West 42nd Street has been
tamed, domesticated and polished into the most exciting, freshest,
most energetic new neighborhood in all of New Yorkfor really
savvy buyers, theres the rapid escalation of land prices along the
western corridor of 42nd Street. (After all, if the real estate
people dont know when a neighborhood is about to bust loose, who
does?)

New York Times (March 27, 1983)

Observation & Problem Identification
Transformation of LES
In the early 2000s, the gentrification of the East Village spread to
the LES
LES becomes trendiest neighborhoods in Manhattan.
New York Magazine described Clinton Street the "hippest
restaurant row" in the LES.
Late 2000s new wave of construction (Blue Condominium, Hotel on
Rivington, several luxury condominiums around Houston, and the New
Museum on Bowery). Thus entering a high-luxury phase similar to in
SoHo and Nolita in the previous decade.
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http://www.city-data.com/neighborhood/Lower-
East-Side-New-York-NY.html#ixzz4cgAAJEg0
Observation & Problem Identification

http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/NY/
Manhattan/Lower-East-Side-Manhattan-
Demographics.html
Observation & Problem Identification

http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/NY/
Manhattan/Lower-East-Side-Manhattan-
Demographics.html
Observation & Problem Identification

http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/NY/
Manhattan/Lower-East-Side-Manhattan-
Demographics.html
Observation & Problem Identification

http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/NY/
Manhattan/Lower-East-Side-Manhattan-
Demographics.html
Observation & Problem Identification

http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/NY/
Manhattan/Lower-East-Side-Manhattan-
Demographics.html
Observation & Problem Identification

http://www.city-data.com/neighborhood/Lower-
East-Side-New-York-NY.html#ixzz4cgAAJEg0
Observation & Problem Identification

http://www.city-data.com/neighborhood/Lower-
East-Side-New-York-NY.html#ixzz4cgAAJEg0
Observation & Problem Identification

Source
http://www.thelodownny.co
m/leslog/2016/05/gentrific
ation-on-the-lower-east-
side-new-report-shows-
were-3.html
Observation & Problem Identification
The Two Bridges Neighborhood Council (TBNC) studies on the
Lower East Side in 2004, the key findings of this study are as
follows:
Demographic
Demographic change in the study area has been marked by
continued displacement of single-family households, specifically
those of Hispanic ethnicity.
The over-65 population of the Two Bridges, Chinatown, and Lower
East Side neighborhoods is increasing, making these aging
populations.
Observation & Problem Identification
Socioeconomic
A large number of households in the study area remains low-income. The
majority of study area Census tracts having median household incomes lower
than those of the rest of New York City.
A high proportion of the population in the study area lives below the poverty
level.
In addition to rising poverty rates in the neighborhoods that contain public
housing, poverty has increased in the southern portion of the Lower East Side,
including Chinatown.
The population of the East Village is wealthier than that in the rest of the
study area. The ever-growing gap between rich and poor increasingly
marginalizes the population in this community.
Observation & Problem Identification
Housing
The Lower East Side Community has simultaneously experienced a
substantial loss of residents in the lowest income group and an
increase in those in the highest income group.
The Lower East Side Community has a large proportion of
residents living in renter occupied units, but data from the
housing Census indicate that the market has been moving toward
more owner-occupied units over the past 10 years.
Rent levels have increased faster than household income in the
Lower East Side
Observation & Problem Identification
Community
Renters whose annual incomes are under $35,000 are, in
general, paying a high proportion of their income in rent.
More than 8,000 units of very-low-income housing were lost
between 1990 and 2000.
This demographic, socioeconomic, and housing analysis shows
clearly that, in these neighborhoods, very-low-income
residents are being displaced and moderate-income residents
are struggling with an extraordinarily high rent burden.
Observation & Problem Identification
Problem on LES gentrification
Displacement of the poor. Tompkins Square Park riot in 1988,
around 300 homeless were evicted
Local government favor the gentrification process.
1. Use of law enforcement (violence) on stabilizing Tompkins Square
Park riot
2. November of 2008, the New York City Council unanimously
approved an East Village-Lower East Side rezoning plan. (push
luxury development into Chinatown and the Lower East Side)
3. In September of 2011, the City Council approved a BID or
Business Improvement District-a public-private entity with the
power to tax property owners
Observation & Problem Identification
Problem on LES gentrification
Social impact of The Frontier rhetoric. Social
perception embodied by the gentrifier; the poor are
seen as uncivil or savages.
They are pictured as a group of people who dont
understand social norms and must be tamed and
controlled by the civil, affluent and proper upper
class)
Concluding Remarks
While gentrification happens physically, we should
also understand non-physical reason behind it.
A solid motif (thought) can be a powerful driving
force for someone to do something.
In the frontier myth, the gentrifier see themselves
as a discoverer, an explorer, a reformer, a hero
But, they dehumanize others, the poor that
displaced due to gentrification
Discussion question
If we have product based on environmental
awareness (e.g., eco-car, green building). Can we also
introduce the social-awareness on the gentrification
process?
In case of Korea gentrification, what is the strong
motif or perception that drive gentrification
process?
Discussion