“The Death and Life of Gentrification: How We Use an Urban Term to Talk About Almost Everything”

Oct. 8, 2026, 7:00–8:30 p.m. Location: Rockefeller Hall 200 Professor and Chair of Sociology at Boston University, Japonica Brown-Saracino, will present from her new book, The Death and Life of Gentrification: A New Map of a Persistent Idea. Sociologist Ruth Glass coined the term gentrification in the 1960s to mark the displacement of working-class residents in London neighborhoods by the professional classes. Brown-Saracino will trace how the word has far outgrown Glass’s meaning, becoming a socially charged metaphor for cultural appropriation, upscaling, and the loss of authenticity. This event is free and open to the public.