The August book of the month is Feminist City (Between the Lines, Toronto, Canada, 2019) by Leslie Kern.
Dr. Kern teaches at a small university in Canada and is a self-described “feminist geographer.” I was excited to read Feminist City because of an interview with the author on the War on Cars podcast, which I have used as part of the Community Transportation Academy curriculum.
Why should we consider gender in urban planning? Just asking the question is pretty radical, if you ask me.
Getting municipalities and specifically urban planners to listen to the experiences of women and other vulnerable citizens has been an uphill battle. Planning considers itself an objective, rational, and scientific field of study and practice. (p154)
Of course it’s no great secret that men and women experience the world differently, but bringing gender considerations into urban planning and urban design is not the norm. Until I encountered Leslie Kern’s work, I admit I hadn’t thought about it much either.
Women’s bodies are still often seen as the source or sign of urban problems. Even young white women having babies have been villainized as the culprits of gentrification, while proponents of gentrification blame single mothers of colour and immigrant women for reproducing urban criminality…there seems to be no end to the ways in which women can be linked to urban social concerns. (p5)
Gender mainstreaming in urban planning is typically confined to considering whether an area is accessible by someone pushing a stroller. While stroller access is certainly important, this is leaning on a set of assumptions that could be problematic - assuming all women are mothers (or will be mothers, or want to be mothers), for one, and assuming that caregiving responsibilities always fall to women, for another.
Even so, urban landscapes are not typically stroller-friendly. (The power broker himself Robert Moses reportedly removed ramps and installed steps in public parks, purely out of spite.) Try pushing one over an icy curb cut in the days following a winter storm. There are time the urban environment feels downright hostile. The author describes her own experience as the mother of a young child struggling to navigate her life in the city: “...the city itself, its very form and function, was set up to make my life shockingly difficult.” She goes on to ask, “What would cities look like if they were designed by mothers?”
It’s problematic to assume that caregiving is a set of tasks relegated to women only, rather than a societal responsibility. Unfortunately, we do make that assumption and as a result, the built environment reinforces oppressive systems without even trying. Care and relationships and social connection are relegated to the margins in favor of efficiency and productivity. What would cities look like if they were designed by mothers? As a mother myself I think back to when my now-teenage children were young, and what comes to mind first are more places to sit down and more public restrooms.
Kern is disparaging of suburbs.
The isolation, size of the family home, need for multiple vehicles, and demands of child care can continue to push women either out of the workplace or into lower-paying, part-time jobs that mostly allow them to juggle the responsibilities of suburban life. (p33)
I have mixed feelings about this. Yes, suburban development has greatly perpetuated car dependence, but suburban demographics have changed significantly in the last few decades, especially since the Recession, and I think there is a lot of room for creatively reimagining the role of suburbs in our society.
It’s not just motherhood, though. Feminist City wrestles with a number of major societal issues through the lens of gender and urban space. Female friendship, the presence of teenage girls, women as political protesters, and threat of harassment in public space are all part of the gendered landscapes that Leslie Kern explores in her book.
Restrictions – self-imposed and otherwise – on women in public have far-reaching implications and connections to other forms of gendered oppression and inequality. (p113)
In Feminist City, Dr. Kern is adept at taking difficult topics head-on and explaining complex concepts in a way that anyone can understand. She weaves in popular culture (there are a surprising number of references to Sex In the City!) and her own experiences so that at times the book reads like a memoir. At times, it’s also frustrating to wallow in societal issues so entrenched - patriarchy, white supremacy, misogyny - that urban planning and design couldn’t hope to solve them.
No amount of lighting is going [to] abolish the patriarchy…any attempt to improve urban safety has to grapple with social, cultural, and economic elements as well as the form of the built environment. (p157)
Still, I highly recommend this book. It’s both readable and thought-provoking. I zipped through it in a week in early July and have been thinking about it ever since. At the very least, it’s validating to read a whole book by someone who mulls over feminism and gender roles even more than I do.
Susan Gaeddert is Community Programs Director at 1000 Friends of Wisconsin, where she runs Active Wisconsin, facilitates the Community Transportation Academy, and coordinates the Wisconsin Climate Table. Have you read any good books lately? Send your recommendation to: susan@1kfriends.org
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