EThnographY of the City
The Bronx & New York City

ANT342: Anthropology of the City
This website is a collaborative research effort from students in the course "Anthropology of the City" at Lehman College, City University of New York.   In this course we have examined cities as historical artifacts, theoretical frameworks, and everyday realities for an ever-increasing share of the global population.  City-dwellers have increased from a scant 3% of the world’s population in 1800, to 14% in 1900, to 30% in 1950.  The trend towards urban living has continued to accelerate, with the world’s population equally divided between urban and non-urban living in 2008.  By 2050, 74% of the world’s inhabitants are projected to live in a city.  While the city has existed as a human organizational pattern for at least 5,000 years, it is only within the past decade that cities shape the contexts of the lives lead by the majority of people living on our planet.

Original Research
This course has provided an opportunity for us to learn together about the city as a theme in human history, as a framework for analyzing social change and progress, and as an organizational and infrastructural grid that shapes our daily lives.  Every student (and the professor) in this class lives in a city and experiences urban life in particular ways.  The course has built on students' lived experiences and knowledge, and harnessed social science research methods to enable students to conduct original research on topics that fascinate them, but that they may have never thought worthy of focused study.  Combining students' ethnographic research on urban contexts with scholarly literature on cities—in theory, practice, and comparative perspective—the course has provided a unique opportunity for students to create new reflections and to generate new knowledge about urban life.

Bronx and New York City Ethnography
Through this course, students combined scholarly study of primary and secondary sources, original ethnographic research, observation, and analysis, with the goal of producing persuasive written and oral communication for a public audience.  Our goal has been to engage in a collaborative study, research, and discussion of the Bronx in particular, and New York City in general, the home context of students in the course.  Through students' individual research projects, gathered together in this collaborative website, we offer here the first iteration of a publicly accessible database concerning urban issues in the Bronx.  It is our hope that this web-based platform for presenting students' original research will ensure that their work will have public impact beyond this course.  It is our long-term hope that students' work, across the semesters, will provide the foundation for issues addressed within the Lehman Lab for Social Analysis and Public Policy.

Student Ethnographers
Sherin Abraham
Gerardo Aparicio
Natalie Aracena
Quaylan Barker
Diagna Camilo
Claire Daugeard
Jessica Guiracocha
Narunee Meesawan
Aicha Meite
Elias Mena
​Mohiba Mohammed
Gerald Nugent
​Angela Paguada

Justin Papa
Joshua Perez
Joshua Polo
Lorissa Ponce
Trishna Ramsamooj
Yessica Rodriguez
Amber Ruiz
Ariella Rosen
Stephanie Sanjuro
​Saima Sawan
Onyika Lorenzo Umelo

For more information: 
Dr. Stephanie Rupp
Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology
Lehman College, City University of New York
[email protected]
​stephanierupp.org