Henry Buhl Library: City, Town, & County Research: Data in Context Resources

Vital Statistics Resources

U.S. Birth Rate Data
Births & Natality (from the CDC).
U.S. Death Rate Data
Deaths & Mortality Data (from the CDC).
U.S. Disease Data
Access data and statistics on a variety of health conditions in the U.S. (from the CDC).
U.S. Marriage & Divorce Rate Data
Access quick marriage and divorce data, as well as detailed state data (from the CDC).
U.S. Suicide Rate Data
Quick facts about suicide in the U.S. For suicide rates by state, visit the Source Table (from the CDC).

Neighborhood, City, Suburb, & Rural Area Resources

America's Changing Neighborhoods: an Exploration of Diversity through Places
Call Number: HA 214 .A44 2017 v. 1-3
A unique panoramic survey of ethnic groups throughout the United States that explores the diverse communities in every region, state, and big city.
Neighborhood and Life Chances: How Place Matters in Modern America
Call Number: HT 123 .N355 2011
Place matters in education, physical health, crime, violence, housing, family income, mental health, and discrimination--issues that determine the quality of life, especially among low-income residents of urban areas.
Stuck in Place: Urban Neighborhoods of Progress Toward Racial Equiality
Call Number: E 185.86 .S514 2013
Sharkey describes how political decisions and social policies have led to severe disinvestment from black neighborhoods, persistent segregation, declining economic opportunities, and a growing link between African American communities and the criminal justice system.

Confronting Suburban Poverty in America
Call Number: HV 95 .K57 2013
The spread of suburban poverty has many causes, including shifts in affordable housing and jobs, population dynamics, immigration, and a struggling economy.
The End of the Suburbs
Call Number: HT 352 .U6 G35 2013
Offering a fascinating and timely portrait of our changing landscape, Gallagher reveals irrefutable reversals taking place - and demonstrates why the post-cul-de-sac future is not a bleak one but a better one. The end of the suburbs, as Gallagher foretells it, will mean stronger, happier, and healthier communities for all of us.

The Death and Life of Main Street: Small Towns in American Memory, Space and Community
Call Number: HT 123 .O78 2012
Miles Orvell wrestles with the mythic allure of the small town in all its forms, illustrating how Americans continue to reinscribe these images on real places in order to forge consensus about inclusion and civic identity, especially in times of crisis.
Hollowing Out the Middle: the Rural Brain Drain and What it Means for America
Call Number: HT 123 .C387 2009
Richard Florida's' The Rise of the Creative Class' famously celebrated the wave of highly productive and creative workers moving to key cities for arts, culture, diversity, and tolerance. But what happens to those towns and rural outposts that the Creative Class left behind? This book explores this question and more.
In the Blood: Understanding America's Farm Families
Call Number: HT 421 .W876 2015
In the Blood paints a vivid and moving portrait of America's farm families, shedding new light on their beliefs, values, and complicated relationship with the land.
Newcomers to Old Towns: Suburbanization of the Heartland
Call Number: HT 384 .M629 S25 2003
In this book, Sonya Salamon explores these rural newcomers and the impact they have on the social relationships, public spaces, and community resources of small town America.
Reinventing Rural: New Realities in an Urbanizing World
Call Number: HT 123 .R436 2016
Reinventing Rural is a collection of original research papers that examine the ways in which rural people and places are changing in the context of an urbanizing world.
Small-Town America: Finding Community, Shaping the Future
Call Number: HT 123 .W88 2013
Small-Town America paints a rich panorama of individuals who reside in small communities, finding that, for many people, living in a small town is an important part of self-identity.

Being Urban: a Sociology of City Life
Call Number: HT 123 .K37 2015
This third edition of a classic urban sociology text examines critical but often-neglected aspects of urban life from a social-psychological theoretical perspective.
The City, Revisited: Urban Theory from Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York
Call Number: HT 123 .C4978 2011
The contributors to The City, Revisited trace an intellectual history that begins in 1925 with the publication of the influential classic The City, engaging in a spirited debate about whether the major theories of twentieth-century urban development are relevant for studying the twenty-first-century metropolis.
The Ghetto: Contemporary Global Issues and Controversies
Call Number: HT 156 .G44 2012
Concise, original essays from top scholars around the world clearly describe essential arguments and discoveries, making the current discussion of marginalized urban spaces accessible for all readers and students of urban studies and sociology.
The Great Inversion and the Future of the American City
Call Number: HT 123 .E37 2012
In The Great Inversion and the Future of the American City we travel the nation with Alan Ehrenhalt, one of our leading urbanists, as he explains how America's cities are changing, what makes them succeed or fail, and what this means for our future.
The Transformation of American Cities
Call Number: HT 123 .T73 2015
Each book in the Reference Shelf series offers extensive, unbiased exploration of a topic of importance in modern society, in a compilation of notable articles from respected publications, abstracts of 20 to 30 additional articles, and a bibliography of other sources.

Race, Poverty/Income, & Urban Sociology Resources

White Flight/Black Flight: the Dynamics of Racial Change in an American Neighborhood
Call Number: HT 221 .W65 2011
The book presents a portrait of the life of a working-class neighborhood in the aftermath of white flight, illustrating cultural clashes that accompany racial change as well as common values that transcend race, from the perspectives of three different groups who are living it: white stayers, black pioneers, and "second-wave" blacks.
More Than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City
Call Number: HN 90.S6 W55 2009
Though the discussion of racial inequality is typically ideologically polarized--conservatives emphasize cultural factors like worldviews and behaviors while liberals emphasize institutional forces--Wilson dares to consider both institutional and cultural factors as causes of the persistence of racial inequality.

The Company Town : the Industrial Edens and Satanic Mills that Shaped the American Economy
Call Number: HT 123 .G723 2010
From the textile mills of Lowell, Massachusetts, to the R&D labs of Corning, New York; from the coal mines of Ludlow, Colorado, to corporate campuses of today's major tech companies: America has been uniquely open to the development of the single-company community.
More Than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City
Call Number: HN 90.S6 W55 2009
Though the discussion of racial inequality is typically ideologically polarized--conservatives emphasize cultural factors like worldviews and behaviors while liberals emphasize institutional forces--Wilson dares to consider both institutional and cultural factors as causes of the persistence of racial inequality.
Separate Societies: Poverty and Inequality in U.S. Cities
Call Number: HV 4045 .G65 2010
In this revised and updated edition of their 1992 book "Separate Societies," "the authors present a compelling examination of the damaging divisions that isolate poor city minority residents from the middle-class suburban majority.

Urban Sociology: Images and Structure
Call Number: HT 151 .F53 2010
Topics include communities in cities, minority and ethnic groups, poverty, power, crime, cities in economic development and underdevelopment, metropolitanization and urban sprawl, and urban policy and planning.
The City, Revisited: Urban Theory from Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York
Call Number: HT 123 .C4978 2011
The contributors to The City, Revisited trace an intellectual history that begins in 1925 with the publication of the influential classic The City, engaging in a spirited debate about whether the major theories of twentieth-century urban development are relevant for studying the twenty-first-century metropolis.