Dragons in a Bag

Set in contemporary Brooklyn, New York, the story gives Elliott a platform for exploring intergenerational Black communities in New York and the threat of gentrification. The novel was published in 2018 and centers around Jaxon, a nine-year-old whose landlord utilizes illegal methods, such as turning off utilities, in an attempt to force the boy and his mother to leave. Jaxon’s experiences in the novel reflect a broader pattern unfolding in New York and other cities across the country. Gentrification is a process in which a low-income urban area experiences an influx of higher-income people who transform housing and businesses, usually displacing current residents. While some see benefits to transforming areas that real-estate developers and investors previously considered undesirable, social scientists and activists point out that gentrification exacerbates social issues like the rising cost of living, housing affordability, houselessness, income inequality, and de facto racial segregation. These problems already disproportionately impact communities of color, which are more likely to be targeted for urban restructuring projects: “Rather than address the enduring and oft-expressed needs of existing Black, poor, and other marginalized communities, such efforts at ‘revitalization’ have tended to prime their neighborhoods for whiter and more affluent residents and consumers” (Boston, Amanda. “Gentrifying the City: From Racialized Neglect to Racialized Reinvestment.” Social Science Research Council, 1 Sept. 2020). Elliott’s novel calls attention to the erosion of Black neighborhoods and speaks to the importance of preserving community, reflecting how gentrification results in the “uprooting of longtime residents, erasure of local histories, and destruction of social networks and community institutions” (Boston). To address this issue, scholars and activists urge policy makers to consider the impacts of structural racism when making plans for their city’s future.