Housing Policies By Max Page And Ellen Pader - 1422 Words

Housing codes in this country shape the way we live. They tell us everything from what is considered to be a bedroom, to how many people can live in one dwelling. Max Page and Ellen Pader looked at two different examples of the way the US’s housing policies have had a major impact on our society. Page examined the tearing down of the slums in New York City. The government claimed that the buildings were old and unsafe, and thus needed to be demolished. Pader looked at eviction of ethnic groups, particularly Latinos, from their homes in Chicago. The rational for the evictions was that there were too many people occupying one space. This was unhealthy, and thus whole families lost their homes. In both instances, the government in mandating†¦show more content†¦In other cultures, such as Latin America, the norms of spatial arrangement are much different. People routinely sleep in kitchens, hallways and whole families share houses. However these policies were attempting t o Americanize the immigrants, and rid them of their heritage. The codes also put a burden on the lower class citizens. By defining what a bedroom was, and how many people can sleep there, the government was telling people what size properties they needed to buy for their families. For the immigrants, who generally lived all together as a family, it meant that they were less able to afford good housing. (Pader 883) Families were routinely shunted to the streets for violations of the codes. However the government saw these steps as necessary. They were attempting to infuse American values and norms onto the immigrants. Two people per room is deemed reasonable and justifiable in our culture. It is engrained in our brains that this is just the way things are. However this spatial arrangement was derived from the lives of upper class Englishmen. (Pader 888) They came about when the immigrants who originally colonized this country, set the norms of the society. When new immigrants came ov er who were seen as inferior, those living here attempted Americanize them in their image. In the hopes to change their mentality and previous perception of norms. The other main code imposed on the people in Chicago was a people per space ratio. In America, we value