I begin in the space between two epigraphs, both compelling and contradictory. Each invokes a different paradigm of wealth and waste. Why tell such contrary stories in the same breath? Both reveal something about the uncanny social worlds at their margins. My pur - pose here is to sketch out the possibilities for lives and livelihoods to persist, even flourish, in ambiguous everyday terrains where such competing economic imaginaries simultaneously hold currency.
In this excerpt from the forthcoming issue of Arena Magazine David Boarder Giles and Anna Carlson explore the politics of homelessness, real estate and the right to the street.
It's early February in Melbourne and police are guarding the footpath. Dozens of them. A yellow fence cordons off the empty bluestone pavement alongside the iconic, century-old facade of Flinders Street Station, which is scheduled for renovation. It's afternoon. Bystanders are gathering in the hundreds now, spilling onto the asphalt.
To my right, hundreds of people herd together behind a barricade, sprawling across the right flank of Red Square. Men and women, mostly young, mostly white, fashionable and collegiate. Aside from the placards and 'Make America Great Again' baseball caps, they're indistinguishable at a glance from shoppers at any of this great nation's great upscale shopping malls. A more urbane set than one imagines as the audience for one of the country's most infamous misogynistic,…
