Reading Response #6
Ashante K. Charles
Professor: Juanli Carrion
Thursday, April 4th, 2019
Sustainable Systems
MUSEUM OF NEW YORK CITY: NEW YORK AT ITS CORE & FUTURE CITY LAB
The two exhibitions introduced both the history and future of New York City, it is very usual that a city would display information and artifacts to navigate the history of their people and the economy. It was an interesting experience to explore both worlds of New York City. Four components of New York’s core is money, diversity, density, and creativity, and these defining features collectively sculpt New York City as what it is today, to the people and the world.
Through the areas of diversity, the exhibit investigated the boroughs of the city where a particular group of immigrants occupied. Since my family is descendants of Haiti, it was informative to see where the majority of the Caribbean community resided in Brooklyn, NY, Haiti as #7 and Trinidad and Tobago #8. Since I’ve settled in Long Island, there is a large sum of Caribbean families who reside in the area of Nassau County, however, Long Island is not considered a borough.
The interactive installation inside “New York at Its Core” allowed me to reflect on the city I live in and my values the question every visitor actively participated in was “What If,” and a majority of the answers were related to us as individuals living on this earth, our values, morals, and hopes. I was hesitant and unsure of what to write, eventually, it finally came to me, my answer was “what if… there was no struggle to be equal.” This may be an objective statement, however, I connected with it, as an African American woman living in New York City.
