 |
|
|
 |
Sunday, November 3, 2002
No easy answers for living patterns
Racism and choice can only partially explain separation
By Brad Heath, and Oralandar Brand-Williams / The Detroit News
DETROIT -- If economics aren't to blame for driving whites and blacks apart in Metro Detroit, what is?
There's no one answer, experts say.
Studying demographics from the U.S. Census Bureau can torpedo myths about segregation, but the numbers can't ultimately show what's responsible for giving Metro Detroit the nation's most separate living patterns. Nor can they suggest how much of segregation is caused because blacks and whites simply don't want to live together.
Experts say they see some patterns that point to people of both races choosing to live apart, a phenomenon known as self-segregation. The most striking proof, they say, is that people with the most money live apart.
"Since these are the people with the resources to live anyplace, that suggests to me that a high proportion of prosperous blacks don't want to be the only black family in the neighborhood," said Harvard University historian Stephan Thernstrom.
That consideration was part of Ida Byrd-Hill's decision to relocate from Ann Arbor to Detroit's East English Village. She grew up in Mount Morris, a mostly white suburb of Flint, an experience she didn't want her African-American children to repeat.
"It wasn't pleasant always having to defend who you are," said Byrd-Hill, whose household income tops $200,000 a year. "I don't want my kids to have to deal with that."
But others say without more integration Metro Detroiters won't really have free choice of where to live because their options will always be limited by fear.
"You could refer to segregation as choice, but it's a choice made under certain conditions of people knowing what kind of position they might be putting themselves in by moving to the suburbs," said John Logan, who studies segregation as director of the Lewis Mumford Center in Albany, N.Y.
And other barriers to integration remain intact, he said. They range from blacks' fears of isolation in all-white neighborhoods, and the reverse among whites, to unfair lending practices and out-and-out discrimination.
Still, Thernstrom thinks that too many of society's ills are blamed on segregation, which he says is not necessarily the culprit many believe. And even if all of history's barriers were torn down, he said, many whites and blacks would still live apart because some people are more comfortable that way. "You can't make the assumption that just because blacks and whites don't live together it's because of discrimination," he said.
You can reach Brad Heath at (313) 222-2563 or bheath@detnews.com.
 |
|
|
|
|
Comment on this story
