Towering Above Harlem

Geographies of Race and the Power of Elite Institutions

Steven Gregory, Arlene Dávila, Elizabeth Chin

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English

New York University Press
16 September 2025

Social discrimination; Urban communities; Ethnic minorities & multicultural studies; Anthropology; Human geography

Charts racialized and class-based exclusion in Morningside Heights and its surrounding area by elite institutions

New York City's storied diversity has also been a story of racialized class discrimination. Towering Above Harlem focuses on understudied players in this process: the elite institutions of Morningside Heights—Columbia University, Teachers College and the Riverside Church—to reveal the troubling ways in which they exploited existing geographic features to build a racially and economically exclusive ""city on a hill.""

In his final book-length work, Steven Gregory explores the long history of economic and racial discrimination in Morningside Heights, beginning in the late 19th century and extending into the present day. This exclusion of the surrounding racial minorities and working-class population has been enacted physically, through the acquisition of property by Columbia and others, but it has also been enacted through a variety of discourses and practices aimed at setting apart the so-called ""civilization-building"" mission of the elites overlooking Harlem from the racialized others in the vicinity. The book shows that the major institutions of Morningside Heights have since the beginning tried to physically secede from the Black and Puerto Rican communities geographically below the Morningside plateau, while also symbolically rising above them as beacons of progress.

The volume charts the coordinated effort among elites to use space to naturalize relations of power and prestige, illuminating the past, present, and uncertain future of racial discrimination and exclusivity in Morningside Heights and in New York City at large.

By: Steven Gregory
Foreword by: Arlene Dávila
Edited by: Elizabeth Chin
Imprint: New York University Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm,
Weight: 522g
ISBN: 9781479831388
ISBN 10: 1479831387
Pages: 336
Publication Date: 16 September 2025
Audience: College/higher education , Further / Higher Education
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming

Steven Gregory (Author) Steven Gregory was the inaugural Dr. Kenneth and Kareitha Forde Professor of African American and African Diaspora Studies at Columbia University. His extraordinary work in Anthropology unfolded in many books including The Devil Behind the Mirror, Santeria in New York City: A Story in Cultural Resistance, and Black Corona: Race and the Politics of Place in an Urban Community. Elizabeth Chin (Editor) Elizabeth Chin is now an independent scholar. Since 2020 she has been Editor-in-Chief of American Anthropologist, the flagship journal of the American Anthropological Association. Much of her work has focused on race and social inequality in the United States. Her books include Purchasing Power: Black Kids and American Consumer Culture, and My Life With Things: The Consumer Diaries. Arlene Dávila (Foreword by) Arlene Dávila is Professor of Anthropology and American Studies at NYU. Her books include Culture Works: Space, Value and Mobility Across the Neoliberal Americas (2012) and Latino Spin: Public Image and the Whitewashing of Race (2008), both available from NYU Press.

Reviews for Towering Above Harlem: Geographies of Race and the Power of Elite Institutions

""A masterful work from the late Steven Gregory, Towering Above Harlem stands as a powerful testament to his legacy as a humanist, activist, urban anthropologist, and uncompromising critic. Exemplifying his sharp, anti-racist analysis and intimate ethnographic style, this book offers a keen examination of the intersections of race, class, and power, exposing how institutional elites manufacture inequality. Gregory’s work challenges readers to engage critically, resist injustice, and never lose hope."" -- Arlene Dávila, author of Barrio Dreams: Puerto Ricans, Latinos and the Neoliberal City ""Steven Gregory has gifted us a third, tremendous contribution to a field he unknowingly pioneered: Black Geographies. Towering Above Harlem will tower over that field in perpetuity. It will also provide a forever manual on how—and why--to read the racialized and spatialized cultures of our most powerful institutions. What a legacy!"" -- Jacqueline Nassy Brown, author of Dropping Anchor, Setting Sail: Geographies of Race in Black Liverpool.