On Friday, February 5, Alford Young, Jr., gave the closing talk for the first day of the Washtenaw Faces Race: America Without Racism symposium. "Redefining Work" covered much of Dr. Young's research in Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor and compared the differences and similarities between small urban areas like Ypsilanti and larger urban areas like Detroit, Chicago, and New York City.

"What struck me about Ypsilanti, though, is that unlike a life in New York City, unlike the several years I spent living in Chicago, I was in a different geographic context. I was intrigued by and curious about how Black Americans made sense of themselves and made their community in a much smaller place--a city that would fit entirely in the neighborhood I grew up in, in East Harlem, New York City."

The 103 interviews Dr. Young and his team conducted served as the background for his latest book, From the Edge of the Ghetto: African Americans and the World of Work.

Dr. Young's talk can be viewed here (starting around the 2:00:00 mark).