How do cities compare in terms of their proportion of chain versus independent restaurants? Dr Clio Andris of Georgia Tech and Dr Xiaofan Liang of the University of Michigan discuss how they measured “chainness” and the geographic and political correlations they found in cities with high vs low proportions of chains. Professor Emeritum Ellen Dunham-Jones leads the follow-up discussion and debate over who is better served by chains versus independents and the implications of both on redesigning cities.

How did the community of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s childhood neighborhood shape his views and the larger Civil Rights Movement? What can historic preservation teach us today about social infrastructure, storytelling and activism? Developer and preservationist Gene Kansas speaks about his new book, Civil Sights, a walk through Atlanta’s Sweet Auburn Historic District that tells the stories of the Civil Rights Movement through its buildings’ occupants and achievements. Clay Kiningham - illustrator of the book, rhetoric scholar Jacqueline Royster, and architect William J. Stanley III, join Gene and Ellen Dunham-Jones discussing the lessons of Sweet Auburn for today.

How do designed landscapes connect us not just to the natural environment and ecology of a place, but to the people and cultural memories that have inhabited it? When should the designer minimize the presence of their own hand and when is it appropriate to intervene with bold and contrasting design ideas to stimulate new forms of occupation of the land? Sara Zewde, Associate Professor in Practice of Landscape Architecture at Harvard and founding principal of Studio Zewde shares her approach to these questions in her design work and forthcoming book on Frederick Law Olmsted’s abolitionist work in the South, followed by a discussion with Ellen Dunham-Jones.