In support of SFU Public Square's first community summit with the Vancouver Foundation, Alone Together: Connecting in the City, SFU Library has created a list of selected books, ebooks, journal articles, and other material available through the SFU Library on the topic of disonnection and isolation.  

Many of the books in this list will be on display at Belzberg Library from August 17 to September 29. 

Books

Those not affiliated with SFU may register for in-person guest access at any SFU Library to view ebooks and journal articles licensed for the SFU Community. 

	Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business [paper book] by Neil Postman 1985
	Being Realistic About Urban Growth [ebook] by Christopher Leo and Katie Anderson 2005
	Better Together: Restoring the American Community [paper book; also available as an ebook] by Robert D. Putnam and Lewis M. Feldstein with Don Cohen 2003
	Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community [paper book] by Robert D. Putnam 2000
	Building, Connecting and Sharing Knowledge: A Dialogue on Linkages Between Communities [ebook] by Infrastructure Canada and Canadian Policy Research Networks (2005)
	Cities and Urban Cultures [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by Deborah Stevenson (2003)
	Cities as Crucibles: Reflections on Canada's Urban Future [paper book] by Francois Lapointe (2011)
	The City: Critical Essays in Human Geography [paper book] by Jacques Lev (2008)
	City Worlds [ebook] by Doreen Messy, John Allen, and Steve Pile (1999)
	Community Indicators Measuring Systems [paper book] by Rhonda Phillips (2005)
	Community Participation and the Spatial Order of the CIty [paper book] by by David Ley (1974)
	Connections and Engagement: A Survey of Metro Vancouver [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by Vancouver Foundation (2012)
	Creative Cities: Structured Policy Dialogue Backgrounder [ebook] by Neil Bradford (2008)
	Cultural Planning for Creative Communities [paper book] by Gord Hume (2009)
	Exploring the Urban Community: A GIS Approach [paper book] by Richard P. Greene and James B. Pick (2012)
	Global Downtowns [paper book] by Marina Peterson and Gary W. McDonogh (2012)
	Government and Communities: Strengthening Neighbourhoods Together [ebook] by Cheryl Gorman (2006)
	A Guide to Planning for Community Character [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by Lane H. Kendig with Bret C. Keast (2011)
	Making Healthy Places: Designing and Building for Health, Well-being, and Sustainability [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by Andrew L. Dannenberg, Howard Frumkin, and Richard J. Jackson (2011)
	Me++: The Cyborg Self and the Networked City [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by William J. Mitchell (2003)
	Music and Urban Geography [paper book] by Adam Krims (2007)
	The New City: How the Crisis in Canada's Large Urban Centres is Reshaping the Nation [paper book] by John Lorinc (2006)
	Peaceful Measures: Canada's Way Out of the 'War on Drugs [paper book] by Bruce K. Alexander (1990)
	Personal Connections in the Digital Age [paper book] by Nancy K. Baym (2010)
	(Re)development at the Urban Edges: Reflections on the Canadian Experience [paper book] by Heather Nicol and Greg Halseth (2000)
	Rediscovering the Wealth of Places: A Municipal Cultural Planning Handbook for Canadian Communities [paper book] by Greg Baeker (2010)
	Research Methods for Community Change: A Project-based Approach [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by Randy Stoecker (2013)
	Revitizalizing the City: Strategies to Contain Sprawl and Revive the Core [paper book] by Fritz W. Wagner (2005)
	Society of the Spectacle [paper book] by Guy Debord (1994)
	Space, the City and Social Theory: Social Relations and Urban Forms [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by Fran Tonkiss (2005)
	Theorizing the City: The New Urban Anthropology Reader [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by Setha M. Low (1999)
	Understanding Community: Politics, Policy and Practice [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by Peter Somerville (2011)
	The Urban Context: Ethnicity, Social Networks, and Situational Analysis [paper book] by Alisdair Rogers and Steven Vertovec (1995)
	Urban Social Geography [paper book ; also available as an ebook] by Paul Knox and Steven Pinch (2006)
	Using Evidence to Inform Practice for Community and Organizational Change [paper book] by Maria Roberts-Degennaro and Sondra J. Fogel (2011)

Journal articles available through SFU Library's site

Those not affiliated with SFU may register for in-person guest access at any SFU Library to view ebooks and journal articles licensed for the SFU Community. 

Atkinson, R. (2009). The politics of knowing: social isolation, disconnection and withdrawal. Geografiska Annaler: Series B Human Geography, 91(4), 299–310.

Amin, A. (2007). Re-thinking the urban social. City: Analysis of Urban Trends, Culture, Theory, Policy, Action, 11(1), 100-114.

Gumpert, G., Drucker, S. (2005). The perfection of sustainability and imperfections in the digital community: paradoxes of connection and disconnection. Digital Cities III Information Technologies for Social Capital: Cross-cultural Perspectives 3081, 363–373.

Head, B.W. (2007). Community Engagement – Participation on Whose Terms? Australian Journal of Political Science 42(3): 441–454.

Hooghe, M., Botterman, S. (2012). Urbanization, Community Size, and Population Density: Is there a Rural-Urban Divide in Participation in Voluntary Organizations or Social Network Formation? Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 41(1): 120-144.

McGuirk, P. (2003). The future of the city: a geography of connection and disconnection. Geodate, 16(4), 5-9.

Schroeter, R. (2012). Engaging new digital locals with interactive urban screens to collaboratively improve the city. Proceedings CSCW 2012, Seattle, WA: ACM.

Journal articles freely available online

Cornwell, E.Y., Waite, L.J. (2009). Social disconnectedness, perceived isolation, and health among older adults. Journal of Health and Social
Behavior, 50(1), 31–48.

Crang, M. (2000). Public space, urban space and electronic space: Would the real city please stand up? Urban Studies 37(2), 301-17.

Hemment, D. (2005). The mobile effect. Convergence, 11(2), 32–9.

Meegan, R., & Mitchell, A. (2001). It’s not community round here, it’s neighbourhood: Neighbourhood change and cohesion in urban regeneration policies. Urban Studies, 38, 2167–2194.

Klinenberg, E. (2002). Alone in the city? An intellectual history of social isolation. Working Paper-02-15. (Northwestern University: Institute for Policy Research Working Paper).

Quan-Haase, A., Wellman, B., Witte, J., & Hampton K. N. (2002). Capitalizing on the net: Social contact, civic engagement, ad sense of community.  The Internet in everyday life, (pp. 291-324). Malden, MA: Blackwell.

Wagner, I., Basile, M., Ehrenstrasser, L., Maquil, V., Terrin, J.-J., and Wagner, M. (2009). Supporting community engagement in the city:
urban planning in the mr-tent. C&T '09: Proceedings of the fourth international conference on Communities and Technologies, (pp. 185-194). New York, NY: ACM.

Additional resources

Delicious, social bookmarking account of SFU Engage

Georgia Straight article "Vancouver study: A city of loneliness and unfriendliness?" by Craig Takeuchi

The Peak article "SFU launches "public square" initiative" by David Dyck

Vancouver Sun article "Opening a public square: SFU closes gap in ‘disconnected’" by Andrew Petter and Carole Taylor

Vancouver Foundation's list of publications and resources which includes Vancouver Foundation Magazine and Connections and Engagement: A Survey of Metro Vancouver