Student Corner: Summary: “Perfectly Positioned: The Blurring of Urban, Suburban, and Rural Boundaries in a Southern Community”

<p>This post provides a summary of the findings and conclusions of “Perfectly Positioned: The Blurring of Urban, Suburban, and Rural Boundaries in a Southern Community”by Betsie Garner. She wrote this article as a PhD candidate at the University of Pennsylvania. The article was published in The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science in July 2017.</p> <p>The author centers the article around a study of Rockdale, Georgia on the outskirts of Atlanta. Change and growth in Rockdale have led to a lack of consensus on the community’s identification as rural, urban, or suburban. Located less than a 30 minutes’ drive from the center of Atlanta, many in Rockdale view the town strictly as a suburb of Atlanta. While others who chose Rockdale for its historic, walkable downtown see it as a small urban center. Still others that live on large pieces of land within Rockdale limits view the community as distinctly rural and rarely venture into Atlanta.</p> <p>The article provides several relevant points that apply to communities across the South, including many North Carolina cities and towns, that can be synthesized to one primary takeaway: “people’s place-based identities are socially constructed through interactions in their own communities, not inherited from demographers and statisticians.” The rural-urban boundary is continually shifting, being crossed, and blurred. While these ideas may seem obvious, they are worth considering when determining the trajectory of a community and what goals for growth can be attained.</p> <p>The first key conclusion is to use social and organic definitions of place when planning future opportunities. [...]</p>