Davarian L. Baldwin is the Paul E. Raether Distinguished Professor of American Studies and the founding director of the Smart Cities Research Lab at Trinity College. He is also the author of Chicago’s New Negroes: Modernity, the Great Migration, and Black Urban Life and a coeditor of Escape from New York: The New Negro Renaissance beyond Harlem. The Marguerite Casey Foundation awarded him its Freedom Scholar designation, and his commentaries have been featured in outlets such as NBC News, PBS, and The Washington Post.