Built environments have structured urban space in racist and classist ways, contributing to residential segregation and related inequalities. Previous research has examined how perceivable built environment features become symbolic boundaries that structure both socio-spatial division and meaning-making, but little research has examined how physical barriers—features that carry symbolic meaning and limit connectivity between nearby areas—may promote both symbolic “othering” and inhibit contact between residents on either side. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, we examine how residents interpret and experience physical barriers and symbolic boundaries in race-, income-, and race-and-income distinct areas in Houston, Texas. We describe three typologies of barriers/boundaries (unremarkable, intrusive, and hyper-salient), demonstrating how the same barrier or boundary can have different meanings for people on either side. For physical barriers, these meanings were often mediated by residents’ actions. Our findings extend theorization of how the built environment shapes interpretations and experiences of segregation, and vice versa.
AndersonElijah. 1990. Streetwise: Race, Class, and Change in an Urban Community. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
2.
ArcherDeborah. 2020. “‘White Men’s Roads through Black Men’s Homes’: Advancing Racial Equity through Highway Reconstruction.” Vanderbilt Law Review73:1259–330.
3.
ArmborstTobiasD’OcaDanielTheodoreGeorgeen, eds. 2015. The Arsenal of Exclusion/Inclusion. New York: Actar.
4.
BartramRobin. 2021. “Cracks in Broken Windows: How Objects Shape Professional Evaluation.” American Journal of Sociology126(4):759–94. doi:10.1086/713763.
5.
BartramRobin. 2022. Stacked Decks: Building Inspectors and the Reproduction of Urban Inequality. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
6.
BayorRonald H.1996. Race and the Shaping of Twentieth-century Atlanta. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.
7.
BellMonica C.2020. “Located Institutions: Neighborhood Frames, Residential Preferences, and the Case of Policing.” American Journal of Sociology125(4):917–73.
8.
BenediktssonMike Owen. 2022. In the Midst of Things: The Social Lives of Objects in the Public Spaces of New York City. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
9.
BinkovitzLeah. 2019. With an Unprecedented Amount of Public Input on the I-45 Project, Now What?Houston, TX: Urban Edge, Kinder Institute for Urban Research.
10.
BonamCourtney M.TaylorValerie J.YantisCaitlyn. 2017. “Racialized Physical Space as Cultural Product.” Social and Personality Psychology Compass11(9):e12340.
11.
BullardRobert D.1987. Invisible Houston: The Black Experience in Boom and Bust. College Station, TX: Texas A&M University Press.
12.
BullardRobert D.2018. Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class, and Environmental Quality. 3rd ed.New York: Routledge.
13.
CharlesCamille Z.2003. “The Dynamics of Racial Residential Segregation.” Annual Review of Sociology29(1):167–207.
14.
ChaskinRobert J.JosephMark L.2015. Integrating the Inner City: The Promise and Perils of Mixed-income Public Housing Transformation. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
15.
ConnerlyC. E.2002. “From Racial Zoning to Community Empowerment: The Interstate Highway System and the African American Community in Birmingham, Alabama.” Journal of Planning Education and Research22:99–114.
16.
ConnollyN. D. B.2014. A World More Concrete: Real Estate and the Remaking of Jim Crow South Florida. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
17.
CookCharles O.KaplanBarry J.1997. “Civic Elites and Urban Planning: Houston’s River Oaks.” East Texas Historical Journal15(2):29–37.
18.
CurtisKatherine J.ReyesPerla E.O’ConnellHeather A.ZhuJun. 2013. “Assessing the Spatial Concentration and Temporal Persistence of Poverty: Industrial Structure, Racial/Ethnic Composition, and the Complex Links to Poverty.” Spatial Demography1(2):178–94.
19.
DantzlerPrentiss. 2021. “The Urban Process Under Racial Capitalism: Race, Anti-blackness, and Capital Accumulation.” Journal of Race, Ethnicity and the City2(2):113–34.
DiMentoJoseph F.C.EllisCliff. 2013. Changing Lanes: Visions and Histories of Urban Freeways. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
22.
Du BoisW. E. B. [1903] 2007. The Souls of Black Folk. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
23.
FaberJacob W.2020. “We Built This: Consequences of New Deal Era Intervention in America’s Racial Geography.” American Sociological Review85:739–75.
24.
FeaginJoe. 1988. Free Enterprise City. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
25.
HunterAlbert. 1974. Symbolic Communities: The Persistence and Change of Chicago’s Local Communities. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
26.
HwangJackelyn. 2016. “The Social Construction of a Gentrifying Neighborhood: Reifying and Redefining Identity and Boundaries in Inequality.” Urban Affairs Review52(1):98–128.
27.
JacksonKenneth T.1985. Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
28.
KimbleMegan.2024. City Limits: Infrastructure, Inequality, and the Future of America’s Highways. New York: Crown.
29.
Korver-GlennElizabeth. 2021. Race Brokers: Housing Markets and Segregation in 21st Century Urban America. New York: Oxford University Press.
30.
KramerRory. 2018. “Testing the Role of Barriers in Shaping Segregation Profiles: The Importance of Visualizing the Local Neighborhood.” Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science45(6):1106–21.
31.
KrysanMariaCrowderKyle. 2017. Cycle of Segregation: Social Processes and Residential Stratification. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
32.
LamontMichèleMolnárVirág. 2002. “The Study of Boundaries in the Social Sciences.” Annual Review of Sociology28:167–95.
33.
LipsitzGeorge. 2011. How Racism Takes Place. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
34.
LoganJohn. 2017. “Racial Segregation in Postbellum Southern Cities: The Case of Washington, D.C.” Demographic Research36:1759–84.
35.
LynchKevin. 1960. The Image of the City. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
36.
MahadeoRahsaan. 2019. “Why Is the Time Always Right for White and Wrong for Us? How Racialized Youth Make Sense of Whiteness and Temporal Inequality.” Sociology of Race and Ethnicity5(2):186–99.
37.
MansonStevenSchroederJonathanVan RiperDavidRugglesSteven. 2019. IPUMS National Historical Geographic Information System: Version 14.0 [Database]. Minneapolis, MN: IPUMS. doi:10.18128/D050.V14.0.
38.
MarshallRichard. 2004. “Contemporary Urban Space-making at the Water’s Edge.” Pp. 11–22 in Waterfronts in Post-industrial Cities, edited by MarshallRichard. London, England: Taylor & Francis.
39.
MasseyDouglas S.2016. “Residential Segregation Is the Linchpin of Racial Stratification.” City & Community15(1):4–7.
40.
McDonnellTerence E.2023. “Cultural Objects, Material Culture, and Materiality.” Annual Review of Sociology49(1):195–220.
41.
MenendianStephenGambhirSamirGailesArthur. 2021. The Roots of Structural Racism Project: Twenty-first Century Racial Residential Segregation in the United States. Berkeley, CA: Othering & Belonging Institute, University of California, Berkeley.
42.
MohlRaymond A.2002. The Interstates and the Cities: Highways, Housing, and the Freeway Revolt. Washington, DC: Poverty and Race Research Action Council.
43.
O’ConnellHeather A.KingLesterBratterJenifer L.2016. “Community Resources in a Diverse City: Supermarket Location and Emerging Racial Hierarchies.” Race and Social Problems8(4):281–95.
44.
RetzlaffRebecca. 2019. “Interstate Highways and the Civil Rights Movement: The Case of I-85 and the Oak Park Neighborhood in Montgomery, Alabama.” Journal of Urban Affairs41(7):930–59.
45.
RileyAlicia R.2018. “Neighborhood Disadvantage, Residential Segregation, and Beyond—Lessons for Studying Structural Racism and Health.” Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities5:357–65.
46.
RinaldoRachelGuhinJeffrey. 2022. “How and Why Interviews Work: Ethnographic Interviews and Meso-level Public Culture.” Sociological Methods & Research51(1):34–67.
47.
RobertoElizabeth. 2018. “The Spatial Proximity and Connectivity Method for Measuring and Analyzing Residential Segregation.” Sociological Methodology48(1):182–224.
48.
RobertoElizabethKorver-GlennElizabeth. 2021. “The Spatial Structure and Local Experience of Residential Segregation.” Spatial Demography9:277–307.
49.
SchindlerSarah. 2015. “Architectural Exclusion: Discrimination and Segregation through Physical Design of the Built Environment.” Yale Law Journal124(6):1934–2025.
ThomasJune Manning. 2022. “Racism and US Urban Planning.” Pp. 63–85 in Infrastructure, Wellbeing and the Measurement of Happiness, edited by MahmoudiHodaRoeJennySeamanKate. New York: Routledge.
WacquantL.WilsonW. J.1989. “The Cost of Racial and Class Exclusion in the Inner City.” The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science501:8–25.
