mobility

Once a nation of movers, the US has lost its “culture of mobility,” a new book argues. That’s been a disaster for housing affordability and economic progress.

The U.S. was once the world’s most geographically mobile society. Now we’re stuck in place—and that’s a very big problem.

The Embarcadero Freeway and the Berlin Wall exemplified how the politics of mobility reflected the arrangements of power in each society.

The Puritan origins of modern ideas about migration.

The fleet provided activists with reliable transportation in hostile and often dangerous environments.

In the 1970s, trucker films like "Smokey and the Bandit" celebrated rebellious, working-class solidarity and freedom, with complex politics at play.

Journalists helped to pioneer what would eventually result in our mobile world.

The bicycle is a symbol of youth, but in the mid-twentieth century it also symbolized Black joy and mobility.

Tracing the histories and legacies of technology and empire through a wooden bicycle at Thinktank Birmingham Science Museum.

Examining slavery, Indian removal, and state policies regulating mobility to trace the constitutional origins of immigration restriction in the 1800s.

The absence of robust transportation infrastructure hurts us — and not only at the gas pump.

An excerpt from a new book that explores the intertwined history of travel segregation and African American struggles for freedom of movement.

How the history of parking in America highlights its societal inequalities.

Confederates kidnapped free Black people to sell into slavery. After the war, two women sought help from high places to track down their lost loved ones.

How incarcerated people have become separated from American society.

Henry Hale Bliss’ death presaged the battle between the 20th-century automobile lobby and walkers in U.S. cities.

Wayfinding through history and design of the cookbook.

The newly empowered federal state created during Reconstruction could restrict immigration much more comprehensively than any state—as Chinese laborers soon discovered.

Restriction and deportation exist in opposition to the political traditions of the African American freedom struggle.

A new biography explores the American roots of Meir Kahane's far-right ideology — and how the U.S. Jewish establishment embraced his beliefs.

How racism has shaped the history — and present — of bicycle use.

Bay’s new book explores the intertwined history of travel segregation and African American struggles for freedom of movement.

A primary source set and teaching guide created by educators.