Book

Un milagro de Loisaida: alternative technology and grassroots efforts for neighborhood reconstruction on New York's Lower East Side

University Microfilms International • Ann Arbor, Mich. • Published In 1992 • Pages:

By: Chodorkoff, Daniel Elliot.

Abstract

This dissertation examines the Puerto Rican community of Loisaida, Manhattan's Lower East Side. The focus of the work is on three grass roots organizations and their efforts at neighborhood reconstruction using alternative technologies (i.e., technologies based on utilizing renewable energy sources), and de-centralist forms of community organization (p. v). Two of these organizations are discussed briefly in the text -- the 11th Street Movement, and C.U.A.N.D.O (Cultural Understanding and Neighborhood Development Organization), but the major emphasis is on Charas, an environmental and cultural group involved in neighborhood education and reconstruction. The author analyzes this group as a component of a social movement, describing its organizational structure, ideological outlook, and its economic forms and programs within the context of the emerging New York Puerto Rican culture of Loisaida. The final section of this study presents a general theoretical discussion of the utopian tradition and how it relates to the environmental movements on the Lower East Side.

HRAF PubDate

2002

Region

North America

Sub Region

Regional, Ethnic and Diaspora Cultures

Document Type

Book

Evaluation

Creator Type

Ethnologist

Document Rating

5: Excellent Primary Data

Analyst

John Beierle ;

Field Date

1977-1979 (p. 10)

Coverage Date

ca. 1970-1980

Coverage Place

Lower East Side, Manhattan; New York, N.Y., United States

Notes

[by] Daniel Elliot Chodorkoff

The functional aspects of the environmental movements described here have been indexed for Environmental Quality (318), with Sodalities (575) added for discussions of organizational structure.Data on these movements as a youth oriented activity were indexed for Adolescent Activities (883).

UM AAC8028991

Bibliography: p. 251-259

Thesis (Ph.D.) -- New School for Social Research, 1980

LCSH

Puerto Ricans--New York (N.Y.)