Newberry Adult Education Seminars will meet both virtually and in the building for the Winter/Spring term. Although we are still primarily virtual, you will find a smaller selection of in-person seminars in the schedule. For more information about the Newberry’s virtual seminars, including a Zoom tutorial, please see our Virtual Seminars FAQ page. If you have questions about online learning, please reach out to adulteducation@newberry.org. Registration opens Wednesday, January 19th at 9am (Central time). Registration will take place through our online platform, Learning Stream.

Register via Learning Stream here

Seminar Description

After the Second World War, Chicago changed. The economic, political, and cultural processes that would lead to suburbanization, White Flight, and the “Rust Belt” were beginning to transform the patchwork of ethnic urban villages that surrounded the Loop and sprawled out to the suburbs. Two iconic texts grappled with where Chicago came from and where it might be going: Nelson Algren’s Chicago: City on the Make (1951) and A. J. Liebling’s Chicago: The Second City(1952). One by an insider who had long chronicled Chicago’s underclass, the other by an outsider who visited for a while. Each book has become an indelible part of our city’s self-image and outsiders’ take on the place. This seminar will explore these two texts (along with excerpts from other works) in their historical context, and in relation to contemporary Chicago’s demographic, political, and cultural transformations.

Six sessions. Registration – $195/$175

Bill Savage has taught seminars on Chicago literature, history, and culture at the Newberry Library since 1992

Materials List

Required:

• Nelson Algren, Chicago: City on the Make(U of Chicago Press, 2011). ISBN: 978-0-226-01386-2.

• A.J. Liebling,Chicago: The Second City (U of Nebraska Press, 2004). ISBN: 9780803280359

First Reading:

• There is no first reading for this seminar.