The racially fragmented city? Neighborhood Racial segregation and diversity jointly considered

Steven R. Holloway, University of Georgia.
Richard Wright, Dartmouth College
Mark Ellis, University of Washington.

The professional Geographer, forum and journal of the association of American Geographers.

    The Article talks about the racial configuration of urban space. The authors reflect that U.S. metropolitan neighborhoods are increasingly divided by race, where there still exist the ever-dominating white neighborhoods and the emerging Latino-dominated spaces.
    The scholars differentiate the neighborhood areas that are predominantly white (host society). These areas are divided into two categories, which depend on if the percentage of the area of whites is less or more than 80%. The remaining areas are later divided up based on their racial composition; 1. Where whites are the minority, 2. Where there is not a racial domination by a single group, and 3. Areas that are dominated by the minority, non-white.
     Their approach on studying these areas is not by analyzing racial mixing, but by studying "multiple types of segregation", placing the importance on the white population. Throughout  the study there was a great interest in neighborhoods with a stable mix of blacks and whites, since this seems to indicate that a mixed neighborhood  is not a result of "the white flight".

Neighborhoods are divided into two different sets, homogenous and  mixed:

Homogenous neighborhoods:
1.    Predominantly white: <80 percent white and no minority>10 percent.
2.    Predominantly black: >50 percent black and no other minority>10 percent.
3.    Predominantly other: >50 percent non black minority and <10 percent black.

Mixed neighborhoods have four subdivisions:
1.    Mixed white/other: 10-50% nonblack minority and ,10% black.
2.    Mixed white/black: 10-50% black and <10% nonblack minority.
3.    Mixed black/other: >10% black, >10% nonblack minority and <40% white.
4.    Mixed multi-ethnic: >10% black, >10% nonblack minority and >40% white.

    There have been other studies where all nonblack minority have been classified into one single group called "other", although this does seems to affect the data quite radically. Another study in 2000 has reported that 57% of mixed neighborhoods in 1970 have remained mixed throughout 1970-1990. A different study found that 80% of mixed-majority white neighborhoods in 1990 remained with the same mix in 2000.

Atlanta neighborhood classified by diversity and racial dominance, 1990 and 200.

Los Angeles Neighborhoods classified by diversity and racial dominance, 1990 and 200.
















After analyzing this information we can conclude that the U.S. is becoming more diverse. The analysis confirms that segregations and diversity are not mirrors of each other. Once we have a full understanding of the difference in the homogenic and diverse neighborhoods we can start to question their origin, for example, how do age and income affect the diversity in each neighborhood?

Hannah Barrueta