CLR Fellow Profile: Carolina Sternberg

Dr. Sternberg’s main areas of research and teaching combine urban studies, Latin American studies, and urban policies in both U.S. and Latin American settings. Her work has examined the relationship between neoliberal urban governance and gentrification in Buenos Aires and Chicago, separately and in comparative analysis. Recently, she has focused her work on the relationship between gentrification and race in African American and Latinx communities in Chicago.

INTERVIEW CONDUCTED BY GRADUATE EDITORIAL ASSISTANT, AMANDA MATTHEWS

What can you tell us about the project your Fellowship focuses on, "Neoliberal Urban Governance. Spaces, Culture and Discourses in Buenos Aires and Chicago"?

First of all, I’d like to thank you and the director of CLR for creating this wonderful and informative newsletter, and for inviting me to share a bit of my research with you and the DePaul community.

My book project is an outgrowth of my doctoral dissertation, and it explores the way neoliberal urban policies & gentrification-led redevelopment projects in the Global North (e.g., Chicago) and South (e.g., Buenos Aires) are increasingly advanced and are successful by mobilizing powerful rhetoric. I argue that this rhetoric (including metaphors, common understandings, imagined spaces) constitutes a critical tool to help build coherence and normalcy for neoliberal policies and redevelopment projects gain traction successfully. In addition, my work supports the notion that neoliberal urban policies operate distinctively across urban spaces, and each one uses distinctive rhetoric to advance its projects.

How do you think your research will influence your work in the classroom?

Something that I really enjoy doing at DePaul is informing my classes with my research and discussing it with my students. In the Winter quarter, I teach a course in the Master’s in Critical Ethnic Studies, titled: “Cities and Racial Formation” (CES 403/LST 310). Here I spend some units discussing how neoliberalism and gentrification are profoundly shaping Chicago’s racial and social inequalities, and how rhetoric contributes to shape neoliberal urban agendas.

What or who has influenced your research?

Throughout my graduate studies, and even today, I’ ve been highly influenced by my graduate advisor’s commitment to social justice, critical thinking, and sharp mind.

Outside the academic world, I’m a person that enjoys watching movies, especially with thick social content. They allow me to explore many other possible worlds that we, as scholars, are not trained or encouraged to do, mostly due to the demands of our professional academic lives. Films (so as books) are great opportunities for me to explore the realm of the unknown, the utopic and dystopic worlds, and the realm of the subconsciousness. These aspects, separately or together, usually help me stay more open and creative in my way of thinking and approaches to research.

What is some advice you have for any/all Latinx interested in higher education and research?

I’ ve been very fortunate to have had two incredible mentors when I was in graduate school, and I remember both telling me to follow my passion to guide me throughout my career. As simple as it sounds, I understand that it’s not that simple to do that. However, I still encourage my students to be true to themselves and be sensitive to their motivations when it comes to choosing a profession and/or career. I always tell them that, if they follow their passion, they won’t ever regret their choice.

What's something you're currently reading and enjoying? (It could be a book that you've finished recently if you're not currently reading anything)

I haven’t gotten much time to read fiction lately, however, one of the books I’ ve recently finished is “On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous” by Ocean Vuong. I’d highly recommend it. It’s incredibly well written, very sad but very hopeful at the same time.