David M.P. Freund

My research interests to date have focused on the intersections between metropolitan change, public policy, and popular ideas about race and inequality in the 20th century United States. In particular, my work has focused on whites' changing assumptions about racial identity (both their own and that of other, "non-white" people) and how these ideas have been shaped by institutional reform and changes in the metropolitan built environment. My first book, Colored Property: State Policy and White Racial Politics in Suburban America (University of Chicago Press, 2007) explores this relationship by linking two stories: the national history of 20th century land use politics, centered on the federal government's role in fueling suburban growth and segregation, and a case study of white exclusionary politics in suburban Detroit. My long-standing interest in the intersection of cultural history and political economy has led me to a new book project, which examines economic growth and popular narratives about inequality from the 1930s until the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980.I also continue to write and teach about cities and suburbs, and am currently preparing a primary source reader in metropolitan history for Wiley-Blackwell's "Uncovering the Past" series. For many years I have contributed to a range of public history and policy/legal projects, including California Newsreel's Race: The Power of an Illusion, the CERD Working Group on Housing Segregation and Discrimination in the U.S., and "Arsenal of Exclusion/Inclusion: The American Way of Living," an exhibit at the 2009 International Architecture Biennale in Rotterdam.I was born and raised in a suburb of Los Angeles that subsequently rebranded itself to promote real estate development. After living for nearly two decades in Michigan, New York, and New Jersey, I now call Silver Spring, Maryland home.
 

Education

B.A. (1987) with honors (in History), University of California, Berkeley; M.A. (1991) European History, Columbia University; Ph.D.(1999) University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
 

Experience

• Associate Professor, Department of History, University of Maryland, College Park, 2007-present
• Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of History, Rutgers University, Newark, 2003, 2005-2007
• Lecturer, Department of History and Writing Program, Princeton University, 1998-2005

Expertise

20th Century United States; metropolitan change, public policy, racial politics, growth politics, inequality