Field Museum of Natural History

Chicago is a young city by world standards. It reinvented itself after the Great Fire and has been going strong ever since. Known for nurturing the arts, industry and architecture, it is also the site of some of the best social science research on urban life. It was in Chicago that the first empirical sociological studies were done of social structure and patterns of organization in American city life (the famous studies of the Chicago School of Sociology of the 1920s and 1930s at the University of Chicago). It was also in Chicago that Jane Addams, Thomas Dewey and others conducted research and implemented programs for progressive education and improvement of living conditions for city residents. In many ways, it is an exemplar of some of the most important social transformations of the twentieth century.

Today, the city is still rapidly transforming, adjusting to the forces of globalization, as are many other cities throughout the Americas. Urbanization—the rapid expansion of cities—is now acknowledged as a universal reality. New approaches are needed to understand the complex processes and patterns that are emerging in these times of transition from an industrial economy to an information-based economy. Anthropology offers a fresh perspective on urbanism, one that draws on its cross-cultural comparative method and its ability to integrate knowledge about the span of human accomplishments over time. As we move ahead in the new millennium, understanding social and economic processes in urban contexts will be more critical than ever.

Some of the questions anthropologists are asking about city life are:

1. What types of communities are residents forming, and how are they reflected in demographic, geographic and spatial arrangements? How are they reflected in the material culture of everyday life?
    
2. What are the ways in which residents shape and interact with the natural environment? While much research has focused on threatened fragile ecosystems such as rainforests or semi-arid regions, little is still understood about urban environments. Within metropolitan Chicago, we have some of the most significant remaining wild prairie and wetland fragments in the entire American Midwest. Now we need to explore how we can effectively engage local communities in the tasks of preserving these wilderness areas, as well as improving local environmental quality overall.
   
3. What are the sources of civic activism? Anthropologists have long refuted the “deficit” model of urban life which assumes that poor communities lack the organizational capacity to improve their conditions. Empirical research has identified the sources for tangible and intangible assets, such as social institutions (church, family, voluntary association), social networks, and historical memory. Building on this research, we can now document community and culture building practices.
   
4. What are the insights into urban history that can be gained from the archeological record? Historical archeology is a growing sub-field which can bring exciting new information to light on the patterns of urban growth, settlement and consolidation.

As we undertake research and public programming to explore these questions, museums can work to form new collaborations with area universities and civic organizations. Urban residents will then be able to have a way to imagine their environs as vital centers of cultural and social life for the centuries to come.

Alaka Wali, Director, and Madeleine Tudor, Center for Cultural Understanding and Change (CCUC), Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, USA