The South Side: The Racial Transformation of an American Neighborhood [Hardcover]

Louis Rosen (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 1998 | ISBN-10: 1566631904 | ISBN-13: 978-1566631907 | Edition: First Edition

A powerful and moving story of the racial transformation of an American neighborhood, told in memoir and oral narrative. It deserves to become a classic....This text needs to be understood and performed at least as regularly as Thornton Wilder's Our Town. --Sandy Primm, St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In the 1960s, Chicago's South Side changed from a predominantly Jewish to a mainly black neighborhood. Having grown up there, Rosen experienced this white flight and decided to conduct a series of interviews with former neighbors and friends, asking them how fear had spread so rapidly and why liberal people appeared to have become bigots. The author is a composer for the theater, and he draws on this career to format the interviews into a type of play, featuring 15 composite characters from both the black and the Jewish communities. Especially interesting are stories of how the first synagogue got started and why it faltered during the racial changes in the neighborhood and had to be relocated. The Jewish residents passionately describe their feelings of betrayal and hurt from the synagogue's loss. Also fascinating are reactions from the black community, past and present, who felt a mixture of confusion, rejection and anger when their white neighbors claimed to be moving because they wanted "better schools." After these admissions, however, the book suffers from repetition, and the 15 characters are not distinguished enough from one another. Each time Rosen identifies a factor for the change, such as whites' suspicion of increased crime from black neighbors, each character comments on the issue without always adding something meaningful to the debate. Although the author's intentions are noble, his method is questionable and, ultimately, unsatisfying.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Rosen examines the phenomenon of white flight in a small neighborhood on the south side of Chicago in the late 1960s. Currently a writer for the musical theater, he was in high school when these wrenching changes took place. In an attempt to understand what happened, he interviewed his former neighbors 30 years later. The result is a composite of narratives detailing the fear, sense of betrayal, and confusion that took place when middle-class blacks moved into a white, middle-class, largely Jewish neighborhood. The oral-history format lends a sense of action and movement to the material and conveys the emotional aspects of this situation. However, presenting personal accounts in a drama format limits the book's usefulness as a research tool. This would complement other, more substantive sources such as Michael Lerner's Jews & Blacks: A Dialogue on Race, Religion, and Culture in America (Dutton, 1996). For larger public libraries.?Deborah Bigelow, Leonia P.L., Little Falls, NJ
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 189 pages
• Publisher: Ivan R Dee; First Edition edition (July 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566631904
• ISBN-13: 978-1566631907
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.1 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,410,787 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bringing Back Memories, December 9, 1998

By 

Karel Kramer - See all my reviews

This review is from: The South Side: The Racial Transformation of an American Neighborhood (Hardcover)

Like the author, I too attended Warren Elementary and Bower High School and oh, the memories his book brings back! My parents "held out" until the summer of 1969, when they moved to San Diego. Their move greatly affected my brother, who was entering his senior year at Bowen. I was in college at the time and noticed the change much less since I was so anxious to get away from home. The irony is that home got away from me! Even if my family hadn't moved to California, I couldn't really return to the Chicago I knew and loved because it doesn't exist for me -- or for any of us who grew up white and Jewish on the South Side -- anymore. I recall the disappointment my parents felt when "Rabbi Fineman" left our synagogue. I now understand why. I believe that by putting his career before his congregation's welfare, he missed the opportunity for "Tikun Olam," to repair the world. Even sadder, our world collapsed. Is it all his fault? Of course not. Could he have made a difference? A tremendous one, I believe. I enjoyed the book tremendously and highly recommend (in fact, INSIST!), that anyone who grew up on the South Side and moved in the late 60s read Louis Rosen's thoughtful and evocative book.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A well-done combination of nostalgia and social commentary., November 4, 1998

By 

[e-mail], Roberta L... (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The South Side: The Racial Transformation of an American Neighborhood (Hardcover)

As an older neighborhood child (Bowen Class of '61), I knew the members of Rosen's age group first as babysitter and then teacher at Bowen (1965-71). I knew well and still see the people who inspired his major characters in the book and enjoyed the accuracy of his portrayals. I was surprised by his strong indictment of the Bowen principal. I remember her as being almost a non-entity, with Mr. Goldberg, who was liberal, non-racist and very caring about all students and faculty, the real leader. I remember my fellow faculty members as also being very welcoming to the new black students and very anxious to offer quality education to all Bowen students. As for the rapid flight, I feel that it was instigated greatly by the ferocious, insidious and constant attack upon the neighborhood by the real estate block-busters. My parents, who refused to move and died in their Pill Hill home in 1988 and 1990 respectively, countered these constant attacks by the blood-sucking realtors with equal doses of verbal venom, alas to no avail! Rosen touched on this subject but did not dwell on it nearly enough. He also should have included statements from the others whites who stayed in their beautiful homes, and are still living to tell their side of the story. Nevertheless, the book was a courageous statement of what had been kept an ignoble secret for too long. It was bittersweet reading, but made me renew my pride that I had the opportunity to teach at Bowen in this historical period and that my parents chose to stay. Thank you, Louis, for writing it.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Rosen's commentary on racism packs an emotional whallop., September 24, 1998

By 

Jason Brett ([e-mail] (Chicago, Illinois) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The South Side: The Racial Transformation of an American Neighborhood (Hardcover)

Every now and then, a distinctive new voice rises above the literary din to announce itself. The most recent example now occupying shelf space in my personal library is Louis Rosen's "The South Side", a minor masterpiece that is one part sociological commentary to three parts emotional journey. Like a well-conceived theater piece, this highly affecting story of a man's search for closure is told in unique fashion through moving testamonials spoken by composite characters from Mr. Rosen's past. Over the course of its brief 183 pages, "The South Side" recounts the rapid and mysterious change in racial demographics in a pocket of Chicago's far south side during the turbulent '60's. While Mr. Rosen's personal experience may seem minute, the issues of fear and racisim he raises in "The South Side" still resonate on a national scale, sadly reminding us of how little has changed in the intervening decades. And while the uniqueness of Mr. Rosen's storytelling device may prove distracting for some, it is just that conceit which gives "The South Side" its capability to engage us on topics to which we seem have become numbed to complacency. Yet in the end, "The South Side" is a simple story of a man returning home to examine his roots and the core issues that shaped him as a child. And it is here that I found Mr. Rosen's book to be most affecting, as he takes the reader along with him on a cathartic, ultimately healing journey back to the old neighborhood.