The Gentrification Balancing Act: Exploring the Nexus of Stigma, Gentrification, and Media Discourse in Third Ward

• In Event: 40821 - Community and Urban Sociology Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 6. Gentrification II

Abstract

Houston’s Third Ward is a historically Black neighborhood that has been undergoing gentrification for the past few decades. As a stigmatized place, Third Ward has been represented negatively in the media in prior decades. Now that the neighborhood is experiencing increased investment and development, what does that mean for its stigmatized reputation? As a neighborhood gentrifies and its demographic composition changes, neighborhood discourse changes to reflect a new neighborhood identity. The objective of this study is to understand the association of discourse change and neighborhood demographic change in Third Ward, uncovering how media discourse is involved in this process. Using structural topic modeling, I analyzed discourse changes in Houston Chronicle articles that mention Third Ward between 1985 and 2024. I find that most of the changes in discourse occur before gentrification. Further, discourse change does not align with neighborhood demographic change in expected ways. This study considers the role that discourse plays in how neighborhoods are both symbolically and physically constructed.

Keywords: gentrification, discourse, territorial stigmatization, text analysis, computational methods

Author

• Jakira Silas, Rice University