Graduation Year
2026
Document Type
Senior Thesis
Degree
Bachelor of Arts
Primary Major
Social Justice
Primary Minor
Political Science
Thesis Advisor
Emily Wu, PhD
Abstract
This project showcases the perspectives of residents in affordable housing in the Bernal Heights neighborhood in San Francisco, CA. The long-time residents share how rising housing costs, redevelopment, and neighborhood change affect their sense of identity, stability, and belonging. In Bernal Heights, as redevelopment projects expand and housing prices continue to rise, long-term residents face pressures that extend beyond affordability. They face the possibility of losing not just housing, but community memory, cultural visibility, and social stability. This research seeks to understand how residents define belonging amid these changes and how displacement operates not only as physical removal but also as structural othering. Through interviews and content analysis of the interviews, the project will also shed light on how service providers in the neighborhood could improve their support for the community residents. While the research for this project is academically grounded, it is also deeply shaped by the author’s own experiences as a Haitian immigrant who has had to rebuild a sense of belonging in unfamiliar systems. Displacement is often discussed in economic terms, reports measure rent increases, housing supply, and property value appreciation. But displacement is not only financial. It is relational, and it alters how people experience safety, participation, community building, and belonging in the spaces they have long called home.