Brahinsky, Rachel

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Conversations on Jesuit Higher EducationVolume 53 Article 7February 2018Teaching and Learning in San Francisco'sGentrification TideRachel BrahinskyFollow this and additional works at: https://epublications.marquette.edu/conversationsRecommended CitationBrahinsky, Rachel (2018) "Teaching and Learning in San Francisco's Gentrification Tide," Conversations on Jesuit Higher Education: Vol.53 , Article 7.Available at: https://epublications.marquette.edu/conversations/vol53/iss1/7                                                                                                                                                                                                               15Gentrification has taken the San Francisco region ina big way. It came through the influx of tech wealththat has stacked the housing market against the mid-dle class. It came, too, through the rising use ofhome-sharing services like Airbnb, which converthouses into hotels and put pressure on the cost ofresidential life. It came through a nationwide shift,where more and more of us are seeking out urban-ism, whether cities are ready or not.       My students at the University of San Franciscowould call the situation quite real, and it is pervasivein our conversations. When prospective studentscome to visit and get a sense of the campus, facultygather with them and share stories about the classeswe teach and the experiences they may have, shouldthey enroll. We can’t help but talk about the chal-lenge of housing and the role that our students willplay in the region as they move from dorm to apart-ment and beyond.       I can imagine a recruitment offi-cer urging me to turn the dialogueelsewhere, but we all know that thisconversation cannot be avoided.Newspapers and blogs discuss thehigh cost of living in San Francisco ona regular basis, and the local and na-tional conversations about changingcities are often focused on the role ofthe Bay Area in exemplifying thegood and the bad of urbanism.        On the one hand, the region isstunningly beautiful and has been acultural hearth for so many communi-ties, attracting waves of immigrants,artists, and people interested in mak-ing a better world in various ways.This diversity is one of the region’sgreatest strengths, generating bothbeauty and jobs. On the other hand,this same diversity has been underthreat by the rapid rise in the cost ofhousing. Many affordable pockets of the region haveflipped in the last five years, with median home val-ues rising over a million dollars and median rentssoaring in new and shocking ways each month.       So how do we handle this? It’s a challenge forfaculty and staff, as much as for students. Housingcosts were central to recent union negotiations andalways present in hiring conversations. We collec-tively engage with the same challenge all San Fran-ciscans face: how to contribute to the region; how tofind a sense of home in a context of a rising cost ofliving; and how to participate in the growth and ex-pansion of the creativity of the region without threat-ening its history. It is indeed an urgent task.       Yet, as my students show me in each urban his-tory seminar: history teaches us that there is a wayto walk lightly in a city, to share in its development,and to contribute rather than only take and consume.Each semester I am inspired by their optimism, andTeaching and Learning in SanFrancisco’s Gentrification TideBy Rachel BrahinskyAbove, Loyola Village residence halls at University of San Francisco.Left, Lone Mountain North residence hall delivers spectacular views of theMarin headlands, San Francisco Bay, and Richmond neighborhood.1Brahinsky: Teaching and Learning in San Francisco's Gentrification TidePublished by e-Publications@Marquette, 201816 CONVERSATIONS ON JESUIT HIGHER EDUCATION                                                                                                                                          I am hopeful about the role that they can play aslong-term residents of the region after college.       My own research has also been a guide for me.I’m currently working on a book that looks at howracism and property have shaped our urban pastand how the activism of communities on these issueshas offered us stories that can help us re-imaginehow we work through the challenges of contempo-rary urbanism like gentrification.       One of the histories that I have focused on is asocial movement led by a group of African Americanwomen in San Francisco’s southeast sector. The storybegins right next door to USF in the Fillmore District,where residents faced dramatic urban change in the1950s and ’60s. City leaders, as part of a national ef-fort to remake cities, identified that neighborhood asa key site for urban redevelopment. The notion ofurban renewal, as the program was called at thetime, sounded upbeat. But it quickly became clearthat one of the primary effects of the program wasthe displacement of a majority African-Americanand Japanese-American community.       The redevelopment program pushed residentsfrom their homes and bulldozed 20 square blocks,including many Victorian structures that were notyet viewed as special. Community pressure was ul-timately successful in forcing the city to replace theold neighborhood with subsidized housing, but thiswas a devastating time and the area still struggles toremake home and a sense of place. The writer JamesBaldwin, in assessing the impact of the program inthe Fillmore and places like it across the country,noted that what had been called urban renewal wasin fact a strategy for “negro removal.”       Meanwhile, the redevelopment program movedon to other parts of the city. Across town, Bayview-Hunter’s Point has been home to an important andinstructive social movement. It’s a neighborhoodthat has long been cut off geographically from therest of San Francisco in spite of the city’s tiny size(it’s only about 7 miles by 7 miles, after all).        In the 1960s, while the Fillmore was facing thosebulldozers, a group of African American women inBayview organized. The group, which was called the“Big Five,” pushed for community participation inthe redevelopment process in their neighborhood.Some of them had lost their homes in the Fillmore;they all had friends and family impacted by the up-heaval there.       Over time, with coordinated efforts across thecity, the Big Five inserted themselves into the urbanplanning process that sought to reshape their neigh-borhood. Through persistence, collective educationaround the rules of urban planning, and direct action– in which they staged a successful sit-in in govern-ment offices to demand funding for affordable hous-ing – the Big Five slowly pushed the wheels of urbanjustice in their favor.       When I had the privilege to interview one of theleaders of the Big Five in her Fillmore District apart-ment years ago, she recounted stories of tenacity andbravery, where poor women with little social capitalforced open a political space in the city and createda place for themselves. These days, the hills ofHunter’s Point once again face economic challenges,but the streets are seeded with the names of the BigFive women and their collaborators. The legend ofthe Big Five is not well known outside of Bayview,but the story sustains people there today who arestill working to redirect urban planning towardscommunity needs.       The lessons of the Big Five are relevant acrossthe city, and indeed in any urban neighborhood. Asthe USF community engages with gentrification andits impacts, we can learn from these histories. It isnot an easy process. These kinds of stories, however,offer a roadmap for challenging the urban status quoand a way through which the USF community canimagine and work for an urban future that includesus all.        It’s a matter of everyday practice. Most of ourstudents spend time doing community work as partof their degree expectations. As our students blendideas and theories about challenges like urban dis-placement with hands-on action that can reshapecities in more equitable ways, they further embedthemselves–and the university itself–as good neigh-bors and long-term caretakers of San Francisco. Themore they can learn to truly listen and engage withlongtime residents like the women of the Big Five,the better our students can design equitable policyand programming for the broader community.Rachel Brahinsky is an assistant professor of urban affairs and urban studies and the faculty director of theUrban & Public Affairs MA program at the Universityof San Francisco.                 2Conversations on Jesuit Higher Education, Vol. 53, Iss. 1 [2018], Art. 7https://epublications.marquette.edu/conversations/vol53/iss1/7

Teaching and Learning in San Francisco\u27s Gentrification Tide

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Teaching and Learning in San Francisco\u27s Gentrification Tide

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