1964: Gentrification

Writing in the book "London: Aspects of Change," British sociologist Ruth Glass coins the term and explains the concept:

     One by one, many of the working class quarters of London have been invaded by the middle classes -- upper and lower. Shabby, modest mews and cottages -- two rooms up and two down -- have been taken over, when their leases have expired, and have become elegant, expensive residences. Larger Victorian houses, downgraded in an earlier or recent periods -- which were used as lodging houses or were otherwise in multiple occupation -- have been upgraded once again. Nowadays, many of these houses are being sub-divided into costly flats or "houselets" (in terms of the new real estate snob jargon). The current social status and value of such dwellings are frequently in inverse relation to their size, and in any case enormously inflated by comparison with previous levels in their neighbourhoods. Once this process of "gentrification" starts in a district, it goes on rapidly until all or most of the original working class occupiers are displaced, and the whole social character of the district is changed.

* Text of Glass' essay (from "The Gentrification Debates: A Reader," edited by Japonica Brown-Saracino, 2013): @

* Glass biography (from Oxford Dictionary of National Biography): @

* "Gentrification" (Oxford Bibliographies): @

* "The New Urban Frontier: Gentrification and the Revanchist City" (Neil Smith, 2005): @

* "There Goes the 'Hood: Views of Gentrification from the Ground Up" (Lance Freeman, 2006): @

* "Gentrification" (Loretta Lees, Tom Slater and Elvin Wyly, 2008): @

* "As 'Gentrification' Turns 50, Tracing Its Nebulous History" (curbed.com, 2014): @

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