Simmel, Park, Wirth e la sfida dell'eterogeneità : considerazioni introduttive

Drawing on Upton Sinclair's novel and a comparison with the human ecology tradition, the author examines how the Chicago School applied biological categories to the study of urban settlements, highlighting both their merits and their oversimplifications. Central to the discussion is the role of money as a coordinating device for social heterogeneity a theme that, following Simmel, tends to be overlooked by his American successors. The essay also addresses the phenomena of the ethnic ghetto, the "romantic temperament", and fashion as mechanisms of aggregation and differentiation in modern cities. The text concludes by re-flecting on the unresolvable tension between urban heterogeneity and attempts to escape it, demonstrating how this ambivalence remains the defining and inescapable feature of metropolitan life. [Publisher's text]