Austin/Life
‘Room 4.202, Garrison Hall, 12am’ flows like blue wispy clouds against a bright morning sun, across the crumpled post-it note that throbs proudly, full of opportunity and hope, in the … Continue reading
From KLEEN Wash to Launderette: Signposts of Gentrification or…?
At the corner of Robert T. Martinez, Jr. and Holly Streets, on the wall of KLEEN Wash laundromat, Our Lady of Guadalupe graces her visitors with a loving gaze and … Continue reading
Austin’s Plaza Saltillo: Place, Practice, and Growth
TEOA enjoys bringing together well-known writers, academics, grad students, and undergrads under one roof. Here UT undergrad Emily Mixon shares a “reflection on the dichotomies between intended and real function … Continue reading
Austin Within and Beyond the Dome
As improbable as the metaphor might seem, Austin is a glimmering and warming snow globe. A steadily growing number of tourists behold a beautiful kingdom of sun. Austin is a … Continue reading
Familiarity in (Sub)Urban Form: The Death of Highland Mall?
Where do malls go when they die? They go to deadmalls.com, or, alternatively, Facebook. In 2009, deadmalls.com visitor “Susan” warned that Austin’s Highland Mall was one foot in the grave: … Continue reading
Hip to the Future
I flew into Austin in 1991 for a musical vacation and spent the rest of the decade there getting a doctorate at UT-Austin in American Studies. The city was strange, … Continue reading
What’s Being Born?
Mourning what’s dying is child’s play. Seeing what’s being born is a lot harder and more interesting. See, for example, Billy Joel’s “Allentown.” At the same time he was crooning … Continue reading
The Souls of Austin
TEOA asked Robert Jensen, “How does a rapidly changing city avoid losing its soul?” Here is his response: The question presumes that Austin has a soul. I’m skeptical, for several … Continue reading
Cities Do Not Have Souls
How does a rapidly changing city avoid losing its soul? First by discarding the idea that it has a soul. Cities do not have souls. They have traditions and histories … Continue reading
Interview: Imagine Austin
Approved by the city council in summer 2012, “Imagine Austin” is a 30-year plan based on 18,500+ ideas and contributions from Austinites. According to the plan’s authors, “Imagine Austin” provides … Continue reading
Between the Windshield and the Rearview
Driving in Austin suggests a metaphor: this town always has one eye on the windshield and one on the rearview. Everywhere you look things are being built, while others … Continue reading
An End Both Slow and Urgent: Blackness in Austin
Like many grad students, I always expected a fairly definitive end to Austin, a time when I was called upon to fulfill my life’s work after years of honing my … Continue reading
Interview with Richard Parker, New York Times
Austin-based writer Richard Parker touched a nerve with his New York Times article about how Lance Armstrong’s rise and fall might reflect what could happen to the city where he … Continue reading
The Mapmaker
Nobody was forced to stay in their neighborhoods. There was no police action or citywide internment. We all just started settling in by our own accord and didn’t notice how … Continue reading
A Conversation With Thor
About halfway through Thor Harris’s A Post Apocalyptic Tale of Friendship (2010), a mutilated and deformed figure hauls a shark-filled aquarium through a desert populated by wilted flora and equally … Continue reading
The Ends of Austins
For some Austin ended when the Armadillo became Threadgill’s South. For others, when S X S W started (or when wristbands began to cost three digits). Or when the warehouse … Continue reading
The End of Austin
What is the End of Austin? It is the beginning of a much-needed conversation about the identity of Austin. Bringing together writers, scholars, and artists from Texas and beyond, TEOA is … Continue reading
The End of Oz-Town
Just before the Austin housing bubble went POP! and Code Compliance hassled the Cathedral of Junk into becoming a permitted structure, the Cathedral’s creator, Vince Hannemann, brought me by his … Continue reading
Photos by Caroline Koebel
Angela Davis and Harriet Tubman street art (and the subsequent absence thereof) on Pedernales between 5th and Santa Rosa, Austin, 78702. November 2012. Caroline Koebel is an Austin-based filmmaker and writer … Continue reading
