The New York Nobody Knows
Walking 6,000 Miles in the City
by William B. Helmreich
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Pub Date Nov 06 2013 | Archive Date Oct 07 2013
Description
As a kid growing up in Manhattan, William Helmreich played a game with his father they called "Last Stop." They would pick a subway line and ride it to its final destination, and explore the neighborhood there. Decades later, Helmreich teaches university courses about New York, and his love for exploring the city is as strong as ever.
Putting his feet to the test, he decided that the only way to truly understand New York was to walk virtually every block of all five boroughs--an astonishing 6,000 miles. His epic journey lasted four years and took him to every corner of Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island. Helmreich spoke with hundreds of New Yorkers from every part of the globe and from every walk of life, including Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former mayors Rudolph Giuliani, David Dinkins, and Edward Koch. Their stories and his are the subject of this captivating and highly original book.
We meet the Guyanese immigrant who grows beautiful flowers outside his modest Queens residence in order to always remember the homeland he left behind, the Brooklyn-raised grandchild of Italian immigrants who illuminates a window of his brownstone with the family's old neon grocery-store sign, and many, many others. Helmreich draws on firsthand insights to examine essential aspects of urban social life such as ethnicity, gentrification, and the use of space. He finds that to be a New Yorker is to struggle to understand the place and to make a life that is as highly local as it is dynamically cosmopolitan.
Truly unforgettable, The New York Nobody Knows will forever change how you view the world's greatest city.
William B. Helmreich is professor of sociology at the City University Graduate Center (CUNY) and City College of New York. His many books include What Was I Thinking? The Dumb Things We Do and How to Avoid Them.
Advance Praise
"A modern-day flaneur, ethnographer William Helmreich moves engagingly through the streets and neighborhoods of New York, making pithy and substantive observations that place the everyday lives of the city's diverse peoples in a peculiarly revealing light. The New York Nobody Knows is a brilliant representation of everyday lives of New Yorkers, and as such--what Baudelaire did for Paris, Helmreich's work promises for New York."--Elijah Anderson, author of The Cosmopolitan Canopy: Race and Civility in Everyday Life
"Helmreich's original and incredible book shows what every nook and cranny of this city looks like from the inside. I have never seen a work that amasses so many observations from so many scenes and deploys them with such elegance. It is a monumental and inspiring achievement."--Mitchell Duneier, author of Sidewalk
"The book offers an intriguing journey through the jagged patchwork of New York neighborhoods. Helmreich is a native son who has never lost his love for the city, its unusual characters, and its capacity to absorb change."--Sharon Zukin, author of Naked City: The Death and Life of Authentic Urban Places
"William Helmreich has walked everywhere and read everything pertinent on New York, and has many astute observations about both the essential spirit of the Big Apple and its rapid changes. Recommended to all lovers of this particular city, and cities in general."--Phillip Lopate, author of Waterfront: A Walk around Manhattan
"Original and important, The New York Nobody Knows presents a picture of the inner life of the city, bit by delightful bit, as a complete whole. The book is enchanting in a wonderfully old-fashioned way."--Peter Moskos, author of Cop in the Hood: My Year Policing Baltimore's Eastern District
"In a clear storytelling manner, Helmreich makes the case that New York is a vibrant, complex, and diverse municipality grappling with a range of social conditions and different forms of social change, all of which are affecting America's major cities. I know of no other work comparable in scope."--Alford A. Young, Jr., author of The Minds of Marginalized Black Men: Making Sense of Mobility, Opportunity, and Future Life Chances
Marketing Plan
Events planned as of July 31, 2013.
3/26/14 Princeton Public Library
11/25/13 Queens Public Library, Ridgewood
11/18/13 Queens Public Library, Flushing
11/4/13 Gotham Center for NY History
10/28/13 Mid-Manhattan Public Library
10/5/13 WORD bookstore, Brooklyn NY
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9780691144054 |
| PRICE | $29.95 (USD) |
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