New This Week: July 15th

How did white residential developers, planning consultants, and their allies in government strategically replace block-level segregation with segregation at the neighborhood level in New South cities such as Atlanta, Baltimore, Birmingham, Houston, Raleigh, and Winston-Salem? That’s the topic of this week’s new release, Good Parents, Better Homes, and Great Schools: Selling Segregation before the New Deal by Karen Benjamin.

Good Parents, Better Homes, and Great Schools: Selling Segregation before the New Deal by Karen Benjamin

“This deeply researched book uncovers how planners, developers, officials, and white parents defended suburban school and housing segregation through a ‘child-centered’ ethos in the early twentieth century. With striking visuals, Karen Benjamin shows how restrictive covenants, exclusionary zoning, and school siting in cities like Atlanta, Raleigh, and Baltimore created a national model that framed segregation as a form of child protection and responsible parenting. A powerful reminder of the segregationist roots—and enduring racial and class consequences—of moving to the suburbs ‘for the schools.'”—Matthew Lassiter, author of The Suburban Crisis: White America and the War on Drugs

“A common response to the persistence of school segregation is the resigned claim that it’s simply the result of segregated neighborhoods. In this powerful and accessible book, Karen Benjamin reveals how southern politicians and developers deliberately created those segregated neighborhoods to make school integration impossible—and how white parents were active participants in that effort. Nuanced and sharply argued, this is a long-overdue answer to a deeply entrenched myth, full of world-altering insight.”—Noliwe Rooks, author of Integrated: How American Schools Failed Black Children