DARNELL-DISSERTATION-2019.pdf (1.29 MB)
Queering Decline: Sexuality, Race, and the Transformation of Twentieth-Century St. Louis
thesis
posted on 2019-08-01, 00:00 authored by Ian Thomas DarnellThe decline of many United States cities is a central theme in twentieth-century urban history. This dissertation queers “decline” by reinterpreting the history of St. Louis, a city that is an iconic and unusually stark example of the phenomenon. Focusing its analysis on the intersection of sexuality and race, the dissertation argues that St. Louis’s decline in large part amounted to a reorganization of metropolitan space jointly structured by heteronormativity and whiteness. Moreover, the dissertation queers the concept of “urban decline” itself, along with its putative opposite, “urban renewal.” Through the lenses of sexuality and race, it argues that “decline” and “renewal” were subjective, mutable, and political categories, and that the processes that they describe were often ambiguous in their consequences.
History
Advisor
Brier, JenniferChair
Brier, JenniferDepartment
HistoryDegree Grantor
University of Illinois at ChicagoDegree Level
- Doctoral
Degree name
PhD, Doctor of PhilosophyCommittee Member
Schultz, Kevin Todd-Breland, Elizabeth Blair, Cynthia Friedman, AndreaSubmitted date
August 2019Thesis type
application/pdfLanguage
- en
Issue date
2019-09-04Usage metrics
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