Brandi T. Summers

Department and Institution: 
Interim Director, Institute for the Study of Societal Issues
Bio/CV: 

Brandi Summers received her Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and is the author of Black in Place: The Spatial Aesthetics of Race in a Post-Chocolate City (UNC Press 2019). Her interdisciplinary research examines the relationship between and function of race, space, urban infrastructure, and architecture. Her second book, Oakland Echoes: Reimagining and Reclaiming the Black City (under contract with the University of California Press), explores the roots and routes of resistance and reclamation, not only as a response to urban gentrification and related economic policies, but also as a quest to think about the past, present, and future of a Black city. Professor Summers is a Contributing Writer for Places Journal and has published several articles that appear in both scholarly and popular publications, including the New York TimesThe Boston GlobeAntipode, and Urban Geography

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