writing

“Leslie Kern is a wonderful writer, and this compelling, important, and highly original intervention in the gentrification debates is a staggering tour de force. At once a devastating critique of the limitations of established perspectives on gentrification and a convincing plea for an intersectional approach, this book offers sparklingly clear analysis and numerous possibilities for political action. Anyone who reads it will never forget it.” Tom Slater, author of Shaking Up the City

“If you’ve ever really wanted to understand what gentrification means, this is the book for you. Kern gets beyond jargon, digs into scores of city stories that show how cities have transformed, and offers trajectories for positive change.” Shawn Micallef, author of Frontier City

Yes! Magazine: 9 Myths About Gentrification: It’s time to stop believing the lie that gentrification is inevitable.

Publishers Weekly: Kern lucidly explains modern feminist and urban theories and brings fresh insights and a measure of hope to a vexing social issue. Progressives will take heart.

The Guardian: It’s not all coffee shops and hipsters: what we get wrong about gentrification. (Opinion)

“Cities aren’t built to accommodate female bodies, female needs, female desires. In this rich, engaging book the feminist geographer Leslie Kern envisions how we might transform the ‘city of men’ into a city for everyone. Let’s all move there immediately.” Lauren Elkin, author of Flaneuse

“Feminist City is brilliant because of the ways it lays out, quite clearly, the fact that cities are designed to discriminate in both overt and hidden ways and that it’s possible to imagine something new—something that is more inclusive of different bodies and experiences.” Evette Dionne, former editor in chief of Bitch

Hazlitt: ‘The Promises of Pleasure, Freedom, Excitement, Opportunity, and Encounter’: An Interview with Leslie Kern

Bitch: Woman-Made World: Inside the Inevitable Rise of the Feminist City

Public Books: What Would a Feminist City Look Like? Talking with Leslie Kern

Vox Highlight: Is it Time to Build Feminist Cities?

CityLab: How to Rebuild Cities for Caregiving

Refinery29: As Women, The Cities We Live In Aren’t Built For Us

“This original study of the gendering processes occurring in the neoliberal city is a significant addition to scholarly debate on cities and gender. Empirically grounded in the intricacies of the condo market in Toronto, it both adds to, and updates, the pathbreaking work around gendered critical urban analysis. An accessible and incisive text that will no doubt instigate future discussions.” Loretta Lees, Cities Group, Department of Geography, King’s College, London