Inventing Times Square: Commerce and Culture at the Crossroads of the World

Book Overview

A unique volume, Inventing Times Square approaches the subject of twentieth-century American city culture through a multidimensional examination of one quintessential urban space: Times Square. Ranging in time from 1905, when the crossroad was given its present name, through to the current plans for redevelopment, the authors examine Times Square as economic hub, real estate bonanza, entertainment center, advertising medium, architectural experiment, and erotic netherworld. Though the volume centers on Times Square, the essays venture much further into urban history and American social history, revealing in the process how Times Square reflected--even epitomized--America as it became an urban consumer culture.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0801853370
• ISBN13: 9780801853371
• Release Date: April 1996
• Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
• Length: 496 Pages
• Weight: 2.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.4" x 9.2"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Ny was better with beggers hookers etc.

Anyone who has actually lived in New York City and not simply "visited" it as the person in the previous review did, would know that New York has a soul and a character all its own. When you take such as the time square area and change it through gentrification, making it Disney shows, overpriced stores, and tourist traps you are basically forcing it to become something its not. Its soul which was naturally created and maintained by the people that lived and thrived there, has been destroyed. It was destroyed in order to essentially superimpose a giant disneyland where the very new yorkers who made times square attain its status as the most recognizable American landmark can no longer afford to buy anything there much less live in or around it. So I'm sure its just peachy one weekend if you wanna blow a little cash at some chain restaurant and see the little mermaid on ice, its the place to go. But for those of us who have grown up in and around times square, we have lost a lil piece of our souls so that people from around the world can see the little mermaid on ice. Compare it to when they closed down your favorite childhood ice cream shoppe in Poughkeepsie, just instead of sprinkles we had hookers; Ya yuppie. -The End