Stigma Cities - by Jonathan Foster

About the Book

The first work to investigate the important effects of stigmatized identities on urban places, Foster's innovative study suggests that reputation, no less than physical and economic forces, explains how cities develop and why. An absorbing work of history and urban sociology, the book illuminates the significance of ideas in shaping metropolitan history.

Book Synopsis

Growing up in Birmingham, Alabama, a city that he loved, Jonathan Foster was forced to come to grips with its reputation for racial violence. In so doing, he began to question how other cities dealt with similar kinds of stigmas that resulted from behavior and events that fell outside accepted norms. He wanted to know how such stigmas changed over time and how they affected a city's reputation and residents. Those questions led to this examination of the role of stigma and history in three very different cities: Birmingham, San Francisco, and Las Vegas.

In the era of civil rights, Birmingham became known as "Bombingham," a place of constant reactionary and racist violence. Las Vegas emerged as the nation's most recognizable Sin City, and San Francisco's tolerance of homosexuality made it the perceived capital of Gay America. Stigma Cites shows how cultural and political trends influenced perceptions of disrepute in these cities, and how, in turn, their status as sites of vice and violence influenced development decisions, from Birmingham's efforts to shed its reputation as racist, to San Francisco's transformation of its stigma into a point of pride, to Las Vegas's use of gambling to promote tourism and economic growth.

The first work to investigate the important effects of stigmatized identities on urban places, Foster's innovative study suggests that reputation, no less than physical and economic forces, explains how cities develop and why. An absorbing work of history and urban sociology, the book illuminates the significance of perceptions in shaping metropolitan history.

Review Quotes

"Stigma Cities sets an example for other scholars' efforts to work effectively with popular-culture sources that help us to understand how images of cities are shaped, contested, manipulated, and changed."--Eric Fure-Slocum, author of Contesting the Postwar City: Working-Class and Growth Politics in 1940s Milwaukee


"Stigma Cities: The Reputation and History of Birmingham, San Francisco, and Las Vegas is a beautifully written, well-researched, and illuminating portrayal of the dynamic history of place stereotype and reputation." --The AAG Review of Books


"A vibrantly written, thoroughly researched, and highly readable work that will appeal to urban, historical, and cultural geographers, particularly those interested in the Southeastern and Western United States. Foster adds valuable perspective to explorations of place-based identity." --Southeastern Geographer


"By exploring how stigma imagery permeates the identities of some cities, this book invites us to think about other instances where similar stigmas exist." --The Journal of American History


"Foster's work has broad applicability not only for urban scholars but also for urban planners, civic leaders, architects, and other practitioners in allied fields." --Journal of Urban History


"The book is firmly rooted in comprehensive and useful theoretical framework provided by Foster's deft explanation of complex sociological and psychological scholarship on the concept of stigma and process of stigmatization. Scholars of the urban South, the civil rights era, and public history will find this book especially illuminating." --Journal of Southern History


"This is an excellent study that should prompt scholars to examine how other communities have dealt with their stigmas." --Western Historical Quarterly