Tri-Co Philly: University City: Race, Power and Politics in Philadelphia

PEAC H327 | Thursday, 12:30–3 p.m.
Dennis Hogan, Haverford College
Andy Hines, Swarthmore College

For over twenty years, the largest private employer in Philadelphia has been the University of Pennsylvania and its hospital system. In fact, three of the top five largest employers are universities and their affiliated medical centers; Thomas Jefferson University and Temple University also make the cut. Including these institutions, there are fifty-five colleges and universities of varying size, shape, and public/private status in Philadelphia. How did it come to be that universities have taken on such a large political and economic role in not just Philadelphia, but many American cities that otherwise share little in common? This class aims to trace the history of higher education and its ongoing impact on the geography, economy, and culture of greater Philadelphia and U.S. urban space broadly. Practically, this means an attention to the urban landscape; social, cultural, and political movements that emerge from these institutions; and how non-profit institutions relate to government at every level. These wide aims require an interdisciplinary approach drawing on work in critical university studies, cultural studies, political and economic theory, history, urban studies, and critical theory.

Students will write papers that engage their relationship to the force of higher education in American cities and that generate historical and cultural investigations of how major institutions impact urban life in Philadelphia. In addition, students will develop creative/critical public projects in myriad formats (video, paper, podcast, historical marker, etc.) that interpret and mark the place of these institutions in Philadelphia while attending to the complexity of university-based community engagement projects. This class will be taught in Philadelphia as part of the Tri-Co Philly Program.