Symbolism isn’t enough: What Tennessee’s MLK streets reveal about investment and power • Tennessee Lookout
Across the country, streets named for Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. don’t need explaining in Black communities.
They are known by feel. Among long corridors where beauty supply stores sit beside corner stores, where barbershops outlast boarded-up buildings, where potholes crowd the pavement and front-porch conversations stretch past sundown. These are not symbolic roads. They are places where Black life continues, day after day, despite decades of disinvestment, living in the shadow of a name th...
They are known by feel. Among long corridors where beauty supply stores sit beside corner stores, where barbershops outlast boarded-up buildings, where potholes crowd the pavement and front-porch conversations stretch past sundown. These are not symbolic roads. They are places where Black life continues, day after day, despite decades of disinvestment, living in the shadow of a name th...
