The Brink interviewed Japonica Brown-Saracino (Professor of Sociology at Boston University) about her new book The Death and Life of Gentrification: A New Map of a Persistent Idea. In the book, Brown-Saracino describes how the world gentrification has evolved from describing neighborhood change (or, brick-and-mortar gentrification) to a broader metaphor. “I think [gentrification has] become shorthand for talking about social inequalities and capitalism without having to call those things by name—to say that something’s been appropriated, or that something’s become more upscale,” Brown-Saracino explains.

In an article for The Conversation, Meaghan Furlano (Sociology PhD Student at Western University) argues that recent trends of “heteropessimism” and “decentering men” are not novel, but rather part of a longer history of frustration in heterosexual relationships. Furlano describes how the division of domestic labor and the idea that women “can effortlessly balance work and family responsibilities in workplaces not designed to support them” have sustained frustrations across decades.

Tressie McMillan Cottom (Professor at the University of North Carolina’s School of Information and Library Science) wrote an op-ed for The New York Times, discussing violence and phone recording by ICE agents in Minneapolis. “The gun and the phone are both weapons, one a tool for violence and the other a tool of control. […] ICE knows that it cannot shoot us all. But the Department of Homeland Security is close to being able to track us all.” McMillan Cottom argues that big data collection and surveillance are threats to our civil liberties. “Many of us have come to believe that our data is something outside of ourselves, when, in fact, data is our self.”

USA Today ran a story on the difficulty and strain of caregiving duties in romantic relationships. The article features Laura Mauldin’s (Associate Professor of Social and Critical Inquiry at the University of Connecticut) new book, In Sickness and in Health, which shares caregiving love stories and describes how inaccessible healthcare and low support for caregivers impacts relationships. “There’s a romanticization of the idea of ‘the one,’” Mauldin commented. “Because we don’t have robust social safety nets, that love that ‘the one’ has then gets transformed into unending, unrecognized labor that really threatens the stability of our relationships.”

Kate Price (Associate Research Scientist at Wellesley Centers for Women) wrote an article for The Conversation on how the law–particularly state law–can further harm sexually exploited minors. Price explains that children can be criminally charged with prostitution in 35 states, which “risks retraumatizing victims by labeling and stigmatizing them as criminal.” Price notes that black and brown children are at a higher risk for being prosecuted.