Category: Research

We see what we expect to see: Part 3, what it means

21 February, 2008 (11:00) | Public housing, Public-Private Partnerships, Research, Theory | No comments

[Continued from Part 1 and Part 2 ]
 
In our examination of Harvard doctoral candidate Laura Tach’s remarkable findings that in HOPE VI properties, incumbent holdovers do not mix with newcomers, largely because the newcomers see things as improved from the past whereas newcomers see the same things as the past continuing into the present.
 

“The future becomes […]

We see what we expect to see: Part 2, what residents see

20 February, 2008 (11:38) | Public housing, Public-Private Partnerships, Research, Theory | No comments

[Continued from yesterday’s Part 1.]
 
Yesterday’s post started with the question of residents’ perceptions of a neighborhood change, particularly when it undergoes comprehensive redevelopment as in HOPE VI.  Do people see the changes?  How do they interpret what they see?
 

HOPE VI: Orchard Gardens, Boston, with the new home-style houses in the foreground
 
To begin with, it’s hard […]

We see what we expect to see: Part 1, why we want to know

19 February, 2008 (10:29) | Public housing, Public-Private Partnerships, Research, Theory | No comments

 
“I am sure that you inquired your way merely in order that you might see him.”
“Not him.”
“What then?”
“The knees of his trousers.”
“ And what did you see?”
“What I expected to see.”
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Red-Headed League
 
When it comes to urban neighborhoods, do we see them as they are, or how we imagine them to […]