New Books in History Damon Scott, "The City Aroused: Queer Places and Urban Redevelopment in Postwar San Francisco" (U Texas Press, 2024)
Jan 27, 2026
Damon Scott, urban historical geographer and author of The City Aroused, traces postwar San Francisco’s queer places and the redevelopment that erased them. He maps unrecorded waterfront sites. He discusses racial mixed maritime communities, policing and raids, legal blight and eminent domain, and how displaced drinking venues sparked collective political organizing.
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Queer Land Uses As A Framework
- Damon Scott coins “queer land uses” to capture commercial activities that accommodated non-normative sexual desires and shaped urban planning responses.
- The term centers property, leases, and state-led planning in understanding how queer life was spatially produced and contested.
Maritime Unions Shaped Mixed Waterfront Life
- Maritime labor organization produced racially mixed and queer-inclusive waterfront social spaces in mid-century San Francisco.
- Integrated hiring halls and the Marine Cooks and Stewards Union fostered cross-racial and queer solidarities that shaped waterfront land uses.
Cold War Purges Recast The Waterfront
- Cold War security screenings expelled suspected homosexuals from maritime trades, concentrating displaced queer people in waterfront hangouts.
- Federal and local purges (the Lavender Scare) transformed labor displacement into intensified queer visibility in city bars.
