Constructing a Fault(y) Zone: Misrepresentations of American Cities and Suburbs, 1900–1950

The way we think about the geography of American cities and suburbs in the first half of this century has, for several decades, been framed by the writings of Ernest W. Burgess, Homer Hoyt, Chauncy Harris, and Edward Ullman. Burgess's zonal model has been especially influential, gaining ascendancy in the postwar period. Contemporaries knew, and recent historical research has shown, that this model was faulty in several important respects. It …