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Neighborhood and Community - Neighborhood Analysis

Dr. Laura Hecht, Sociology
CSU Bakersfield
Soc 477: Neighborhood and Community, Spring, 2002

PAPER 1:  NEIGHBORHOOD ANALYSIS

Citation:
Gold, Harry. 2002. "Neighborhoods, Networks and Associations," Chapter 5 in Urban Life and Society. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Step 1:  Understand neighborhood boundaries used by the U.S. Bureau of the Census:

Read the following materials and be able to define thoroughly what census tracts and block groups represent, and how the boundaries are created.Do this by going to: http://www.census.gov/geo/www/ . Scroll down and click on “Geographic Programs,” then on “Participant Statistical Areas Programs.”There is additional information at http://www.census.gov/geo/www/.Click on “Understanding Census Geography,” then on “Census 2000 Geographic Terms and Concepts.”

• Identify your neighborhood and get a map.
• Go to http://www.census.gov/.Then, click on “American FactFinder,” located in a list on the left side of the page.Next, click on the link “Enter a street address to find Census 2000 data” in upper left corner of page.A page will come up that allows you to enter your address.Do it, and then click “Go”.The box on the bottom of the page that comes up lists your Census Tract and Block Group.Click on the block group to highlight it, then, click the “Map It” button.You will get a street map with the census tract and block group designation of your neighborhood.Save this map and put it into a Word file by following these steps:1) using the right mouse button (the one you hardly ever use), click anywhere inside the map.A menu will pop up.Click on “Save Image As,” and choose a filename from the box that pops up, and save the file.2) Start Word.Click on “Insert” from the menu bar, and choose “Picture,” then “From File” from the list.Choose the file where you saved the picture from the box that opens up.Now you have the map in a Word file, which means it will be easy to include it in your paper.
• Collect statistical data on your census tract/block group:
To get data for your neighborhood (your block group), repeat the steps you took for getting your map, but instead of clicking the "Map It" button, click the Go button (located under the Map It button).  The page will reload, with two new headings at the bottom.  Click on Census 2000 Summary File 1 (SF 1) 100-Percent Data.   When the new page loads, you click on Change Selections at the top, then choose Tables.  Notice that there will already be one table in the selection box:  H1. Housing Units.  Leave it in there, and begin to select others.  Click on P1. Total Population in the upper box to highblight it, then click the ADD button.  You will now see it in the lower box.  Continue adding tables to the lower box, until you have added all of the following:  P1, P10, P13, P15, P17, P18, P31, P32, P33, P34, H1, H3, H4, for a total of 13 tables (out of the possible 286).  This list represents the minimum necessary for your analysis.  If other look interesting to you, feel free to add them.  Once you have all the desired tables added to the lower box, click Show Table.  Print the tables to bring to class.
Collect the same statistical data on Bakersfield, for comparison:
There are several ways to do this.  The easiest way is to simply use the Back button on the browser to return to the page that lists the census tract and block group numbers for your address.  Click "County Subdivision: Bakersfield CCD" to higlight it, then click Go.  If you get lost, you can arrive at this page by repeating all the steps you took to get statistics on your block group, but of course highlighing "County Subdivision: Bakersfield CCD" rather than "Block Group" before you click Go.
Once you click Go (and the page has loaded), youwill see a number of links at the bottom of the page.  There are more than you saw when you were obtaining Block Group level data, simply because there are more statitics available for the larger geographic area (city) than the smaller (block group).  Move all the way to the last link, and click Census 2000 Summary File 1 (SF 1) 100-Percent Data.   Just as you did on the last step, click Change Selections at the top, then choose Tables.  The screen that appears looks exactly the same as it did when you were collecting your block group data.  Follow the same steps to add the same tables to the box (P1, P10, P13, P15, P17, P18, P31, P32, P33, P34, H1, H3, H4).  If you added any additional tables when doing your block group statistics, add them here too.  Click Show Table.  Print the tables to bring to class.
Create tables for your analysis by converting the raw numbers you printed out from the census web page to percentages where appropriate, and create tables (in Word) to display those percentages.  We will go over this in class before your tables are due.

Make observations, conduct informal interviews, etc, to collect information to enable you to 1) discuss the six functions of neighborhoods as they apply to your neighborhood (Gold, pp. 102-105),  and 2) to consider the adequacy of the neighborhood typologies for categorizing your neighborhood (Gold, pp. 106-110).  We will spend some time in class brainstroming about the types of information you might want to collect.

• 20%: Discuss: 1) how census tract and block group boundaries are created by the Census Bureau give neighborhood boundaries, and 2) describe the boundaries of your neighborhood (include the map), and 3) discuss the adequacy of the census-defined boundaries in defining the “true” boundaries of your neighborhood.  Show how your definitions are either consistent with or differ from the two offered by Glass and the one by Abrahamson.
• 20%: Describe your neighborhood using statistical info from census; comparing with city stats, and compare your neighborhood characteristics on these indicators with Bakersfield as a whole . Include your tables.
• 20% Describe your neighborhood in terms of the qualitative/observational data you collected. Find a way to summarize your observations in an organized way.
• 40%: Analyze your neighborhood: along two themes:  1) Discuss the six neighborhood functions, and drawing from the data you collected as evidence, tell which functions are emphasized in your neighborhood, and 2) Classify your neighborhood using the typologies from the readings. You may be able to fully describe your neighborhood using one typology, or you may have to combine features of two or more. Feel free to create an ideal type that best describes your neighborhood by adding dimensions not covered by the typologies given in the readings. You must thoroughly defend your categorization. Be aware that the analysis section of your paper that the reader is likely to approach with skepticism. Be very clear about how you arrived at your conclusions about your neighborhood, drawing systematically on the discussions from the readings, and illustrating your argument by making specific and appropriate references to the quantitative and qualitative data described earlier in your paper. Be aware that in this section, I am looking for synthesis.