SPATIAL IN/JUSTICE, SPATIAL HISTORY, AND IMMERSIVE REALITY: BUILDING A PROTOTYPE IN BOSTON-THURMOND/UNIVERSITY PARKWAY

ABSTRACT

This project brings UNCSA students and faculty into collaboration with resident organizers in Winston-Salem’s Boston-Thurmond neighborhood, a once-thriving, predominately Black and mixed-income neighborhood that was divided and harmfully transformed by the construction of University Parkway in the 1950s-‘60s. The team will produce a digital 2D map and prototype immersive reality experience showcasing significant spatial histories in Boston-Thurmond that intersected with the construction of University Parkway. In the process, the team will analyze how the inclusion of urban spatial history in immersive reality applications can help to advance restorative sociospatial justice in cities characterized by durable structural inequities, such as Winston-Salem.