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Sand Rush: The Revival of the Beach in Twentieth-Century Los Angeles de Elsa Devienne

Sand Rush: The Revival of the Beach in Twentieth-Century Los Angeles

Autor Elsa Devienne Cuvânt înainte de Jenny Price
en Limba Engleză Hardback – 26 sep 2024

Această monografie istorică, publicată sub egida Oxford University Press, ne propune o perspectivă surprinzătoare asupra unuia dintre cele mai iconice peisaje americane: țărmul orașului Los Angeles. Considerăm că Sand Rush este o lectură esențială pentru a înțelege cum plajele din Santa Monica sau Malibu, pe care le percepem astăzi ca fiind naturale, sunt în realitate rezultatul unui proiect masiv de inginerie și planificare urbană desfășurat între anii 1920 și 1960.

Elsa Devienne documentează meticulos eforturile unui așa-numit „beach lobby” format din elite de afaceri și oficiali locali, care au curățat și extins malurile, uneori triplându-le suprafața originală, pentru a acomoda stilul de viață suburban. Ne-a atras atenția analiza critică a autoarei asupra costului social al acestui succes: în timp ce plajele deveneau „locuri de joacă” moderne, ele erau structurate pentru a exclude comunitățile de afro-americani sau grupările considerate marginale, precum culturiștii sau persoanele gay. Textul este susținut vizual de 39 de ilustrații alb-negru care evidențiază transformarea radicală de la barăci și docuri vechi la autostrăzi și parcări vaste.

Cartea acoperă o arie tematică similară cu The Lure of the Beach – A Global History de Robert C. Ritchie, însă acolo unde Ritchie oferă o perspectivă globală și culturală asupra fascinației umane pentru litoral, Elsa Devienne adoptă o abordare mult mai specifică și politizată. Dacă The Frontier of Leisure de Lawrence Culver explorează atitudinea generală a Californiei de Sud față de recreere, Sand Rush se concentrează strict pe infrastructura fizică și socială a coastei, oferind un studiu de caz detaliat despre cum intervenția umană a modelat identitatea regională.

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Specificații

ISBN-13: 9780197539750
ISBN-10: 0197539750
Pagini: 328
Ilustrații: 39 black and white halftones
Dimensiuni: 150 x 224 x 33 mm
Greutate: 0.59 kg
Editura: Oxford University Press
Colecția OUP USA
Locul publicării:New York, United States

De ce să citești această carte

Recomandăm această carte studenților la istorie urbană și pasionaților de ecologie politică. Cititorul va descoperi că paradisul californian nu a fost un dar al naturii, ci o construcție deliberată, menită să prevină „migrația populației albe” dinspre coastă. Este o analiză fascinantă despre cum ingineria poate crea ecosisteme artificiale durabile, dar și despre modul în care spațiul public a fost folosit ca instrument de segregare socială.

Despre autor

Elsa Devienne este o istorică specializată în istoria Statelor Unite și a mediului, cu un interes deosebit pentru dezvoltarea urbană a secolului XX. Lucrarea sa de față, Sand Rush, reflectă rigoarea academică specifică cercetărilor sale asupra modului în care politica și ingineria se intersectează în modelarea spațiului public. Prin expertiza sa, ea reușește să deconstruiască mitul „natural” al coastelor californiene, oferind o perspectivă critică asupra modului în care orașele moderne își gestionează resursele naturale în beneficiul anumitor grupuri sociale.

Descriere

The first history of the formidable campaign that transformed Los Angeles into one of the world's greatest coastal metropolises, revealing how the city's man-made shores became the site for the reinvention of seaside leisure and the triumph of modern bodies.The Los Angeles shoreline is one of the most iconic natural landscapes in the United States, if not the world. The vast shores of Santa Monica, Venice, and Malibu are familiar sights to film and television audiences, conveying images of pristine sand, carefree fun, and glamorous physiques. Yet, in the early twentieth century Angelenos routinely lamented the city's crowded, polluted, and eroded sands, many of which were private and thus inaccessible to the public. Between the 1920s and the 1960s, LA's engineers, city officials, urban planners, and business elite worked together to transform the relatively untouched beaches into modern playgrounds for the white middle class. They cleaned up and enlarged the beaches--up to three times their original size--and destroyed old piers and barracks to make room for brand-new accommodations, parking lots, and freeways. The members of this powerful "beach lobby" reinvented the beach experience for the suburban age, effectively preventing a much-feared "white flight" from the coast. In doing so, they established Southern California as the national reference point for shoreline planning and coastal access. As they opened up vast public spaces for many Angelenos to express themselves, show off their bodies, and forge alternative communities, they made clear that certain groups of beachgoers, including African Americans, gay men and women, and bodybuilders, were no longer welcome. Despite their artificial origins, LA's beaches have proved remarkably resilient. The drastic human interventions into nature brought social and economic benefits to the region without long-term detrimental consequences on the environment. Yet the ongoing climate crisis and rapid sea level rise will eventually force the city to reckon with its past building.Sand Rush not only uncovers how the Los Angeles coastline was constructed but also how this major planning and engineering project affected the lives of ordinary city-dwellers and attracted many Americans to move to Southern California. Featuring a foreword by Jenny Price, it recounts the formidable beach modernization campaign that transformed Los Angeles into one of the world's greatest coastal metropolises.

Recenzii

A marvelous combination of urban, environmental, social, cultural, and policy history, Sand Rush explains a vast expanse of LA history and geography. About a city as much defined by its coastline as by its boulevards, freeways, and diverse communities, this book presents the contested meanings of a famous and understudied space. Get Sand Rush, go to the beach, and read about the making of modern nature.
We tend to think of beaches and coastlines as timeless features of the natural world, a space out of time. But in this captivating, revelatory history of America's most iconic beachfront, Devienne shows that they have been anything but. From the polluting industries that once fouled its waters and sands, to the coastal engineers and urban planners who sought to mold these dynamic environments into spaces of pleasure and profit, to the social engineers who attempted to control who could enjoy it and where, Devienne shows how America's coastlines have long held a mirror to the societies they surround. A stunning achievement.
Thoroughly researched and beautifully contextualized, Sand Rush expertly documents how embedded the beach is within the Los Angeles civic imagination and what a precise barometer of class and racial privilege it remains.
Elsa Devienne has written the book that a lot of us were waiting for but couldn't have imagined ourselves. With insights into environmental, social, urban, and political history, Devienne has taught us not only about the beach we love, but also about the beach we never knew.
In Elsa Devienne's Sand Rush, the beaches of greater Los Angeles are finally understood for what they are: not just places for fun in the sun, but crucibles for US environmental and urban planning, environmentalism, and civil rights.
A masterful history.
I love this book because, on almost every page, I learned something new about the Southern California beaches I enjoy so much-everything from why the beaches physically exist to why the public has access to them.
Sand Rush offers historical insights to academics, practitioners, and policy analysts on a range of topics that will be central as Los Angeles faces fundamental and likely transformative change due to rising sea levels. From the politics of public space to the privatization impulse of well-to-do coastal residents to the dynamic nature of coastal landscapes and the (potential) hubris of coastal engineering, Sand Rush reminds us of the centrality of the beach in Los Angeles's past and future.
Sand Rush is a compelling contribution to urban and environmental history.

Notă biografică

Elsa Devienne is Assistant Professor in US History at Northumbria University. Her work has won the Willi Paul Adams Award awarded by the Organization of American Historians for the best book on American history published in a language other than English. She regularly appears on radio, podcasts, and TV shows to speak about her research in English and French.