The Origins of the Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit

Thomas J. Sugrue

Dec 2020 · Tantor Media Inc · Narrated by Adam Lofbomm

About this audiobook

Once America's "arsenal of democracy," Detroit is now the symbol of the American urban crisis. In this reappraisal of America's racial and economic inequalities, Thomas Sugrue asks why Detroit and other industrial cities have become the sites of persistent racialized poverty. He challenges the conventional wisdom that urban decline is the product of the social programs and racial fissures of the 1960s. Weaving together the history of workplaces, unions, civil rights groups, political organizations, and real estate agencies, Sugrue finds the roots of today's urban poverty in a hidden history of racial violence, discrimination, and deindustrialization that reshaped the American urban landscape after World War II.

About the author

Thomas J. Sugrue is the David Boies Professor of History and Sociology at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of Not Even Past: Barack Obama and the Burden of Race and Sweet Land of Liberty: The Forgotten Struggle for Civil Rights in the North.

Adam Lofbomm's passion for language inspired him to read broadly, write extensively, speak publicly, and perform on-stage and on-camera. In 2006, when he stepped into the vocal booth for his first narration job, all those many pieces clicked into place. He realized that voice acting was what he was made to do.