Slum

John Lancaster’s text, Next Stop, Squalor, stirs mixed feelings in me. Lancaster uses harsh words to describe the slums of Dharavi. However, the conditions of these slums are so bad that it is hard to use any other words. Lancaster did not include something he should have, a quote from someone who lives in the slums. Lancaster wrote this piece attempting to invoke understanding about Dharavi. Lancaster specifically targeted the environmental way of life the Dharavi people immerse themselves in.…

Integration is the elimination of barriers and enclosures that may limit free mobility and set up of positive non-hierarchical relationships (Marcuse, 2005). It means that spatially distributed resources and assets such as neighbourhoods, public facilities (schools, recreation areas and health facilities etc.) are shared by the members of different groups (Hartman & Squires, 2010). Many studies (Balbo & Navez-Bouchanine, 1995; Deffner & Hoerning, 2011; Kempen, 2007; Madrazo & Van Kempen, 2012)…

In the chapter “From personal tragedy to public health crisis” of the book “Lead Wars: The Politics of Science and the Fate of America's Children” by Markowitz and Rosner, the lead poisoning and the actions taken is discussed. In the early 1900’s, health departments throughout the U.S. were not communicating and helping each other to fight the public threat of lead. Therefore it was easy for the Lead Industries Association (LIA) to downplay the impact of lead and for manufactures to avoid…

urban growth around the world (Cohen, 2006), but also by the social and political violence that has affected the country for decades, which has generated the displacement of about three million Colombians increasing urban poverty and the growth of slums (Calderon, 2008). Colombia has been classified as one of the most violent countries in the world at international level countries (Cotte, 2011). The increase of violence in Colombia is due to the presence of armed groups and drug trafficking,…

critical analysis on the first few chapters of Katherine Boo’s novel, ‘Behind the Beautiful Forever’, discussions were related to the general socioeconomic constraints slum dwellers face in Mumbai. This second critical analysis of chapters five through eight will focus specifically on the development obstacles of a young Muslim slum dweller, which led a simple argument amongst neighbors to result in a false conviction. While the method of discerning the development obstacles is one often used in…

The book Find Me Unafraid: Love, Loss, and Hope in an African Slum was assigned to the class, and after receiving the assignment I assumed it would just be another boring book that education is notorious for using in Composition classes. To my surprise, I was very intrigued by this book and what it had to offer. What Kennedy and Jessica’s story taught me most was about perseverance. The two made some great changes in the slums, but I believe that their perseverance was what lead them to all…

Part One Ascribed Status (pg. 98) – A position an individual either inherits at birth of receives involuntarily later in life. Something I learned from the film that relates to ascribed status is how the people in the slums of Dharavi are typically generational ‘slumdogs’. This means they were probably given this low, economic status and label at birth, and this has been passed down generation from generation. The stigma attached to the label follows as well. With the movie Slumdog Millionaire,…

The creation of Dharavi in India began in 1882 created by the many rural poor migrating to its location. The immigrants are known as the heart and soul of Dharavi. The residents originated from multiple locations across Asia, most from Mumbai which is the mega city that surrounds it. This precisely explains how Dharavi is known for housing such a vast amount of culture and diversity. Among its estimated 500,000 inhabitants, 33% are Muslim, 6% are Christian, and 60% are Hindu. With so many people…

I viewed Rosie Fonetenelle Cleans the Bathtub. This image entails a woman cleaning a bathtub in an extremely small bathroom. There are clothes all over the floor – even trash. This photograph gives us a view into the deplorable conditions of the Slums African Americans were forced to occupy – as described by Malcom X. The…

relationships between characters who would otherwise have no reason to interact. The novel first establishes the reader in the panoramic view of London. In the early Victorian era, London was expanding and becoming more industrial. London was a mixture of slums and palaces, law courts and graveyards, shows the variety and sheer number of people living in the city. Given its centrality to the novel, the city itself becomes a character, expanding the characters relationships to include their…