This is a companion bibliography, reference sheet, and toolkit to the work I’ve built over a decade, which reflects my journey to a black queer feminist practice and ethic.
Just over a decade ago, I was a curious curator and voracious reader of thought around urban planning, architecture, public health transportation, and other elements that govern how humans create and maintain societies. Plus, I was someone starting the process of decomposing my Christian faith, decolonizing my thoughts around my ethnicity and nationality and way of making a living and learning my sexuality and gender identity were not as straightforward as I once believed.
I am using this page to provide you with resources and books to understand and practice urbanism from this perspective, especially if you too share intersections with these identities.
This is a living document, which means I will add and subtract as I see fit and find that resources and books have changed and updated and I ask that if you choose to share it, please note that it came from Kristen Jeffers, The Black Urbanist.
If you want to join me on a more guided journey with these and other resources, the Black Queer Feminist Urbanist School is re-launching soon. Join my newsletter list to find out more information on our relaunch date.
However, you can be part of our pilot groups, one for Black, Indigenous and others who experience being marginalized as People of Color that’s free-of-charge and one for those who would consider themselves allies, accomplices and who otherwise don’t identify as a marginalized person of color, by pledging at least $40 monthly on Patreon.
You can also support this work with a one-time donation/tip via Venmo, or Cash App. Plus resources with an asterisk (*) are affiliate links.
If you are a member of the press and you would love to get my expert commentary on deadline, you can reach me at (301) 578-6278.
You can also find me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIN.
More About Me
Kristen E. Jeffers (she/her) is the founder and editor-in-chief of The Black Urbanist multimedia platform, as well as an author, textile artist and designer, urban planner and activist. She holds a Master of Public Affairs focused on community and economic development from the University of North Carolina Greensboro, and a Bachelor of Arts in communication with a concentration in public relations from North Carolina State University. She has presented at the annual gatherings of the Congress for New Urbanism, YIMBYTown, Walk Bike Places, CityWorksXpo, APA Virginia, NACTO and to communities around the US and Canada, using her personal story to illustrate what land use and planning really means and really does, plus encourage practitioners, both young and old in best practices. She is a Streetsblog Network member and has also contributed articles to CityLab, Greater Greater Washington, [Greensboro] News & Record, Yes! Weekly, Grist, Next City, Better! Towns and Cities, Triad City Beat, Urban Escapee and Urbanful and appeared on several NPR affiliate stations (KCUR, WAMU and WUNC) as a commentator and expert.
Books
Purchase all Bookshop.org and support both me and independent booksellers They have e-books in addition to print*
Find any of these books on WorldCat in your closest local library
-
Chocolate Cities: The Black Map of American Life — Drs. Marcus Anthony Hunter and Zandria F. Robinson
-
Root Shock: How Tearing Up City Neighborhoods Hurts America and What We Can Do About It — Dr. Mindy Thompson-Fulilove
-
Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds — Adrienne Maree Brown
-
The Warmth of Other Suns — Isabel Wilkerson
-
Parable of the Sower — Octavia Butler
-
Parable of the Talents– Octavia Butler
-
Sister Outsider — Audre Lorde, Edited by Cheryl Clarke
My Most Relevant Articles from The Last 10 Years of Running the Platform
Are There Really Too Many Planners in Certain Metro Areas?
The Continuous Quest to Mentally Cope With Modern Civic Life as a Young Black Woman Professional
How Do You Define Your City? And Does Your City Define Itself in the Same Way?
Building on Theories and Practice of Black Urbanism in Our New World
Questions to Ask (and Traps to Avoid) When Considering a Career in Placemaking
The Quest for a Forever Home in an Era of Mass Gentrification
Place in A Time of Terror and Inequality
Why Road Gentrification Is Good Gentrification
Putting Place and Experience Back Into Retail
Why We May Never Have the Right Words for the Places We Live
Things that Should Never Be in Driving Distance
Whose Suburbs are We Talking About Again?
Can We Let the People Gentrify Themselves?
The Privilege of Urbanism, The Democracy of Placemaking
Everything I Learned About Place, I Learned on Campus
The Common Man’s Legacy in A City
Coming Back to the Streets, Coming Back to Action
The American Expat, In America
Does it Matter Who Owns the Corner Store?
The Creative Class: Off the Record and On The Money
The One Key Reason Those Scary Housing Discrimination Maps Are Still True
Are There Really No Things to Do for Young Black Professionals in North Carolina?
Podcasts
-
Nancy
-
Marsha’s Plate
-
Making Gay History
Research Reports
Race, Space and the Poetics of Planning: Toward a Black Feminist Space-Making Practice — Chandra Christmas-Rouse
Tools
-
Mailchimp* — email newsletter, really robust tracking of opens and where people live and segmenting lists to specific people.
-
BlueHost* — website hosting, specifically WordPress
-
Google Suite — Drive, Docs, Forms
-
Typeform— survey software
- Black, womxn-identified people, please take this survey and help me better document and serve you!
-
Adobe Creative Cloud — Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign
-
Quickbooks — financial statements and invoices