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Nemoy Lewis

Assistant Professor
Areas of ExpertiseFinancialization of housing; Political economy of housing; Anti-Blackness and housing; Urban housing policy; Race and inequality

Biography

Nemoy Lewis is an assistant professor in the School of Urban and Regional Planning. He received his PhD in human geography from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. Lewis earned both his undergraduate and master’s degrees in geography at the University of Toronto. For his doctoral research, Lewis analyzed the ongoing foreclosure crisis in the United States and its effects on Black people and low-income communities in Chicago, Illinois and in Jacksonville, Florida. Lewis' research explores how space is racialized by examining the co-production of racialization and financialization in North American urban housing markets, and the growing affordability problems impacting Black renters. His current research investigates a relatively new type of financialized landlord – primarily private equity, asset management firms and REITs – and their impacts on the physical infrastructures and urban social geography of disenfranchised communities.

Lewis recently commenced two major research projects that explore access to housing for Black Canadians. The first study examines the housing affordability and eviction crises by exploring financialized landlords and the broader consequences for Black renters during the COVID-19 pandemic in Toronto. His second project aims to understand the distinct challenges Black Canadians face in their pursuit of home ownership.

Lewis has co-authored a paper on race and urban politics in Ferguson, Missouri in the leading geography journal, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space (2016) and a book chapter for a special collection Gentrification as a Global Strategy: Neil Smith and Beyond (Routledge, 2018). Most recently, he wrote an invited commentary piece about the unexpected nexus between anti-Black police violence and real estate financing in the United States for the journal, EPD: Society and Space. Additionally, Lewis has a forthcoming invited book chapter entitled, “The Impact of Foreclosures on the Home Environments and Education of Black Youth in U.S.” in the text Education in the Cosmopolis.

Teaching responsibilities:

  • PL 8304: Housing
  • PLG 731: Field Trip Course
  • PLG 200: Planning Principles
  • PLG 720: Advanced Planning Studio II
  • PLG 620: Advanced Planning Studio I

Teaching interests:

  • Housing
  • Qualitative research methods
  • Urban public policy
  • Urban planning process 

Research interests:

  • Financialization of housing
  • Blackness and anti-Blackness and planning
  • Evictions and displacement
  • Urban racial capitalism
  • Affordable housing
  • Political economy of housing
  • Human right to housing
  • Urban social policy
  • Housing justice movements
  • Gentrification and neighbourhood dynamics

Research projects:

  • Buying While Black: Barriers to Black Home Ownership (In collaboration with Black Planning Project)
  • Housing Insecurity for Black Renters: COVID-19 and the Fight to Remain Housed

Articles:

Book chapters:

  • Lewis, N. (In Press). The Impact of Foreclosures on The Home Environments and Education Of Black Youth In The United States. In S. R. Schecter & C. E. James (Eds.), Education in the Cosmopolis: Routledge.
  • Cowen, D., & Lewis, N. (2018). Revanchism and the Racial State: Ferguson as ‘Internal Colony’. In A. A. N. Benach (Ed.), Gentrification as Global Strategy- Neil Smith and Beyond (pp. 259-279). New York, NY: Routledge.
  • Lewis, N. (2017). "Anti-Foreclosure Activism in Chicago." In Neoliberal Chicago edited by Larry Bennett, Roberta Garner and Euan Hague. Champaign, 225. Chicago, IL: Illinois University of Illinois Press

Commentaries:

  • Lewis, N. (2020). Anti-Blackness Beyond the State: Real Estate Finance and the Making of Urban Racial Capitalism. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space.

Reviews: