The Death and Life of Main Street - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook The Death and Life of Main Street write by Miles Orvell. This book was released on 2012-10-01. The Death and Life of Main Street available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. For more than a century, the term "Main Street" has conjured up nostalgic images of American small-town life. Representations exist all around us, from fiction and film to the architecture of shopping malls and Disneyland. All the while, the nation has become increasingly diverse, exposing tensions within this ideal. In The Death and Life of Main Street, Miles Orvell wrestles with the mythic allure of the small town in all its forms, illustrating how Americans continue to reinscribe these images on real places in order to forge consensus about inclusion and civic identity, especially in times of crisis. Orvell underscores the fact that Main Street was never what it seemed; it has always been much more complex than it appears, as he shows in his discussions of figures like Sinclair Lewis, Willa Cather, Frank Capra, Thornton Wilder, Margaret Bourke-White, and Walker Evans. He argues that translating the overly tidy cultural metaphor into real spaces--as has been done in recent decades, especially in the new urbanist planned communities of Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk and Andres Duany--actually diminishes the communitarian ideals at the center of this nostalgic construct. Orvell investigates the way these tensions play out in a variety of cultural realms and explores the rise of literary and artistic traditions that deliberately challenge the tropes and assumptions of small-town ideology and life.
Main Street
Main Street - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Main Street write by Sinclair Lewis. This book was released on 2022-08-01. Main Street available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Carol Milford dreams of living in a small, rural town. But Gopher Prairie, Minnesota, isn't the paradise she'd imagined. First published in 1920, this unabridged edition of the Sinclair Lewis novel is an American classic, considered by many to be his most noteworthy and lasting work. As a work of social satire, this complex and compelling look at small-town America in the early 20th century has earned its place among the classics.
The Real Thing
The Real Thing - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook The Real Thing write by Miles Orvell. This book was released on 2014-08-25. The Real Thing available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. In this classic study of the relationship between technology and culture, Miles Orvell demonstrates that the roots of contemporary popular culture reach back to the Victorian era, when mechanical replications of familiar objects reigned supreme and realism dominated artistic representation. Reacting against this genteel culture of imitation, a number of artists and intellectuals at the turn of the century were inspired by the machine to create more authentic works of art that were themselves "real things." The resulting tension between a culture of imitation and a culture of authenticity, argues Orvell, has become a defining category in our culture. The twenty-fifth anniversary edition includes a new preface by the author, looking back on the late twentieth century and assessing tensions between imitation and authenticity in the context of our digital age. Considering material culture, photography, and literature, the book touches on influential figures such as writers Walt Whitman, Henry James, John Dos Passos, and James Agee; photographers Alfred Stieglitz, Walker Evans, and Margaret Bourke-White; and architect-designers Gustav Stickley and Frank Lloyd Wright.
Main Street
Main Street - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Main Street write by Mindy Thompson Fullilove. This book was released on 2020-09-08. Main Street available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Mindy Thompson Fullilove traverses the central thoroughfares of our cities to uncover the ways they bring together our communities After an 11-year study of Main Streets in 178 cities and 14 countries, Fullilove discovered the power of city centers to “help us name and solve our problems.” In an era of compounding crises including racial injustice, climate change, and COVID-19, the ability to rely on the power of community is more important than ever. However, Fullilove describes how a pattern of disinvestment in inner-city neighborhoods has left Main Streets across the U.S. in disrepair, weakening our cities and leaving us vulnerable to catastrophe. In the face of urban renewal programs built in response to a supposed lack of “personal responsibility,” Fullilove offers “a different story, that of a series of forced displacements that had devastating effects on inner-city communities. Through that lens, we can appreciate the strength of segregated communities that managed to temper the ravages of racism through the Jim Crow era, and build political power and many kinds of wealth. . . . Only a very well-integrated, powerful community—one with deep spiritual principles—could have accomplished such a feat.” This is the power she hopes we will find again. Throughout Main Street, readers glimpse strong, vibrant communities who have conquered a variety of disasters, from the near loss of a beloved local business to the devastation of a hurricane. Using case studies to illustrate her findings, Fullilove turns our eyes to the cracks in city centers, the parts of the city that tend to be avoided or ignored. Providing a framework for those who wish to see their communities revitalized, Fullilove’s Main Street encourages us all to look both inward and outward to find the assets that already exist to create meaningful change.
Main Street Blues
Main Street Blues - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Main Street Blues write by Richard O. Davies. This book was released on 1998. Main Street Blues available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. A study of the history of the town of Camden, Ohio. Drawing on the works of novelists--particularly Camden native Sherwood Anderson, sociologists, anthropologists, and political scientists, as well as a variety of local sources, the author explores the small farming community as it was affected by land speculation, the railroad era, the automobile, and the post-World War II loss of business and population to the cities of Dayton, Hamilton, and Cincinnati. Paper edition (unseen), $20.00. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
