Atlantan Exceptionalism: How Civic Elites Avoid a Tainted Regional Reputation in the American South

• In Event: 40821 - Community and Urban Sociology Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 2. Constructing Place Character

Abstract

This paper examines the historical role of city elites in propagating and maintaining Atlanta’s reputation as an urban exception in the South—as “the city too busy to hate”—along with a series of pivotal events that caused ruptures to this reputation and what they reveal about conflicting audiences these elites have played to when managing the city’s reputation. Drawing from six months of field work, 49 interviews, and historical research across multiple archives in the city, we establish evidence of Atlanta civic and business community explicitly branding the city as an exception to the American South’s reputational racism dating back to almost immediately after the Civil War, taking stage nationally during the Civil Rights Era and becoming part of a broad city marketing strategy in the contemporary moment. More than this, though, we also show that this self-conscious reputational place making strategy occurred alongside moments that had the potential to puncture it, eg race massacres, protests against segregation, and local opposition to a dinner celebrating Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. for winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Building off these historical cases to examine the ways Atlanta managed its precarious reputation in pursuit of placemaking itself as distinct from the rest of the American South, we draw connections to the present moment in the city when it is embroiled in debates about inequality, gentrification, and police violence. Ultimately, we ask what has the Atlanta business community done at moments in time when it became apparent that perhaps the city isn’t too busy to hate? Put differently: how have city elites coordinated, strategized, or otherwise acted to maintain a brand that is remunerative to them and to their constituencies in an effort to avoid a stigmatized regional reputation? We conclude with broader lessons about the nested nature of place reputation.

Authors

• Jeffrey Nathaniel Parker, University of New Orleans

• Ciel Quebedeaux, University of New Orleans