Flourishing in LA: Making Place in the Anti-Black Metropolis

My dissertation examines where Black people across the class spectrum feel good in Los Angeles County and how those places enable psychological and social well-being. Despite anti-Blackness, displacement, and a mental health crisis, Black people flourish and make LA a more livable space. In my dissertation, I explain how Black people challenge the bleak racial future by prefiguring individual well-being through Black placemaking and flourishing activities at the macro- and meso-levels (e.g., community development and businesses). I conceptualize flourishing activities as dynamic antecedents to flourishing. I argue flourishing activities are agentic and creative practices that make geographies rewarding, satisfying, and dignified.

Immersing myself in Los Angeles County for over two years, I conducted an ethnography of Destination Crenshaw (a $100 million reparative development project and open-air museum), observed various businesses and sites of Black placemaking, conducted a survey, and interviewed residents, workers, city employees, politicians, and business owners. The Institute for Humane Studies, The Haynes Foundation, The Russell Sage Foundation, the American Sociological Association, and the USC Equity Research Institute have supported my dissertation research.