This assignment is based upon our reading this semester of The Creative Destruction of New York City: Engineering the City for the Elite by Alessandro Busà (2017) and the documentary film, My Brooklyn by Kelly Anderson (2012). The weekly power point slides and your journal submissions will also be helpful.
Now that you’ve completed the book, I’d like you to reflect on all that we discussed this semester and view the movie My Brooklyn (2012). The link to the film is in the Assignments folder in Blackboard. As you will see, the movie highlights so many of the concepts and discussions that we had this semester. The film is 77 minutes long and was written and directed by Professor Kelly Anderson, of Hunter College, CUNY.
In the first part of the paper, I’d like you to summarize (IN YOUR OWN WORDS) what the book AND the film were about. In what ways do they connect to each other? Please include a favorite quote from the book AND the movie that expresses best what/who a city is for? (Be sure to put the closed caption on while viewing the film).
In body of the paper, I’d like you to discuss THREE important factors that led to the “creative destruction” of Brooklyn that were discussed in the film, using the concepts and ideas we learned in the book and discussed this semester. Explain each factor in your own words, describe how it is expressed in the film, and how it connects to the book. You should consider using direct quotes from the book and the film that help support your explanation. It may be helpful to look through the weekly classnotes and the journal questions to help you think of three distinct factors.
For the conclusion of your paper, reflect on what you learned this semester in this course. How did the book and the film deepen your understanding of the gentrification process? Would you recommend the book for others to read? Why/Why not? Would you recommend the film for others to see? Why/Why not? In what ways do you see the city differently after taking this course?
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A few IMPORTANT reminders:
1. Please do not wait until the last minute to do this. You’ve come this far, continue to give this and all your classes all that you can. After viewing the film and completing the book, I would recommend you start to outline the paper, then write a rough draft and revise this into a final version. You have more than enough time to do this well, as long as you do not put it off.
2. Do not copy anything from an outside source. I have already accessed ALL of the written reviews of this book and the movie. If you copy any part of these, this will be obvious, and you will receive a zero for this assignment.
3. If you want to use an outside source, please be sure to correctly cite it in your paper (See Using Proper Citation file in Assignments folder) and include it in a Works Cited page.
4. If you would like to use something from our course materials (book, any resources on Blackboard), please use proper citations. See Below
5. Your last page (page 6) should be a Works Cited page.
Please watch this film, My Brooklyn (2012), as part of your last assignment. Remember to choose captions.
