Designing the American City: Civic Aspirations and Urban Form

This course is an interpretive look at the American city in terms of changing attitudes toward urban life. City and suburb are experienced as the product of design and planning decisions informed by cultural and economic forces, and in relationship to utopian and pragmatic efforts to reinterpret urban traditions in search of American alternatives. Topics include persistent ideals such as the single-family home, attitudes toward public and private space, the rise of suburbs and suburban sprawl, cycles of disinvestment and renewed interest in urban centers, and impacts of mobility and technology on settlement patterns. The recorded lectures are from the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences course United States in the World 29. (4 credits)