Diverging Space for Deviants: The Politics of Atlanta’s Public Housing
Diverging Space for Deviants: The Politics of Atlanta’s Public Housing is a 75-year history of the first public housing program in the United States. When the Atlanta Housing Authority demolished one of its last developments in 2011, it removed one of the last spaces in the city for Black feminist working-class and working-poor politics. At its peak, nearly ten percent of the city’s residents lived in one of the 32 public housing developments across the city. Using the unique multi-scalar positioning of the public housing development – federally-funded, state-legislated, and locally-administered – tenant associations were able to mobilize a wealth of resources to overcome the different levels of marginalization and exclusion faced by their constituents. Public housing developments in Atlanta pre-date the full enfranchisement of the city’s Black residents, and it is in these origins that the politics of public housing residents transform to account for the many forms of exclusion, difference, and deviance over time. The purpose of this book is to demonstrate how necessary the work of public housing and its tenants, planners, policymakers, and administrators was in making the “mecca” of Atlanta: a place for a thriving and sustained Black middle- and working-class.
Available at UGA Press: https://ugapress.org/book/9780820359526/diverging-space-for-deviants/
and local independent bookstores via bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/books/diverging-space-for-deviants-the-politics-of-atlanta-s-public-housing-9780820359526/9780820359526
Release Date: May 15, 2021
Thank you to Atlanta Studies for digitizing the front matter timeline of Diverging Space for Deviants: The Politics of Public Housing
Reviews and Talks:
“BAR Book Forum: Akira Drake Rodriguez’s “Diverging Space for Deviants” by Roberto Sirvent. February 17, 2021. https://www.blackagendareport.com/bar-book-forum-akira-drake-rodriguezs-diverging-space-deviants?page=1
The Politics of Tenant Organizing: Georgia State University and Auburn Avenue Research Library Freedom School Series featuring Elaine Osby: https://youtu.be/P2eTslTkvwM
“A New Book Explores the Lost Political Power of Atlanta’s Public Housing.” Interview with Stephannie Stokes on WABE/NPR-Atlanta, May 17, 2021: https://www.wabe.org/a-new-book-explores-the-lost-political-power-of-atlantas-public-housing-tenants/
“Urban planning and politics in Atlanta.” Kristina García. PennToday. May 25, 2021: https://penntoday.upenn.edu/news/urban-planning-and-politics-atlanta
(Excerpt of Chapter 3): Drake Rodriguez, Akira. “Black Women at the fore: Perry Homes and the Transformation of Tennant Activism in 1960s Atlanta.” Atlanta Studies. May 26, 2021. https://doi.org/10.18737/atls20181218
“How Atlanta’s Public Housing Created Spaces for Black Women to Organize.” Jared Brey. NextCity. June 29, 2021: https://nextcity.org/daily/entry/how-atlantas-public-housing-created-space-for-black-women-to-organize
“Review of Diverging Space for Deviants: The Politics of Atlanta’s Public Housing.” Hilary Wilson. Progressive City. July 2021. https://www.progressivecity.net/single-post/review-diverging-spaces-for-deviants-the-politics-of-atlanta-s-public-housing
Alistair Sisson & Pratichi Chatterjee (2021) Beyond shelter: the political work of housing Diverging space for deviants: the politics of Atlanta's public housing, International Journal of Housing Policy, 21:4, 629-634, DOI: 10.1080/19491247.2021.1957216
Mara Sidney (2021) The powers of public policy in Diverging Space for Deviants, International Journal of Housing Policy, 21:4, 626-629, DOI: 10.1080/19491247.2021.1957257
Paul Watt (2021) Analysing race, gender and class in Atlanta's public housing, International Journal of Housing Policy, 21:4, 634-636, DOI: 10.1080/19491247.2021.1957253
David P. Varady (2021) A. Drake Rodriguez: Diverging Space for Deviants: The Politics of Atlanta’s Public Housing. J Hous and the Built Environ 36, 1831–1834 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10901-021-09900-6
Samantha Thompson (2022). Understanding Black feminist spatial politics in Atlanta’s public housing, City, DOI: 10.1080/13604813.2022.2046906