Slums?

What is a slum exactly? After hearing in class that we do in fact have slums in the United States, I started wondering where they were, or what they were like. I know they existed in the past, but I kept thinking we were too rich of a country today to have slums, at least not like the slums that exist in some developing countries. When I started a Google search on slums, the term “slums of shaolin” automatically popped up. Knowing that this was a reference to Staten Island, I checked it out. Granted, this was a term made popular by rap group the Wu-Tang Clan, yet I was very surprised to find out that they (and many others) consider the North Shore of Staten Island to be “rough and tumble.” Port Richmond, West Brighton, Park Hill, Mariners Harbor…considered slums? I live there! I’ve grown up in these places and I’ve never in my life considered them to be slums; some are worse off than others as far as being low income/high crime areas, yet they would probably be paradise to people coming from slums in places like Lagos, or Mumbai.

In an article from the Boston Globe titled “Learning from Slums” (http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/03/01/learning_from_slums/?page=2) states that the term “slum” itself can take on different meaning depending upon the country it is in. I found out that, “In the United States, it is often used to refer simply to marginalized neighborhoods, but in developing countries, it usually means a settlement built in or near a city by the residents themselves, without official authorization or regulation. Housing is typically substandard, and the infrastructure and services range from nonexistent to improvised.” So, this made me feel a bit better, and a little less like a slum-dweller…at least the North Shore of Staten Island has clean drinking water, the ability to effectively get rid of waste, and a somewhat stable infrastructure.

“Learning from Slums” was a really good article actually, for anyone with any interest in the topic, check it out.