Final Reflection Paper

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Chicago, on Lake Michigan in Illinois, is among the largest cities in the U.S. Famed for its bold architecture, it has a skyline bristling with skyscrapers such as the iconic John Hancock Center, sleek, 1,451-ft. Willis Tower and neo-Gothic Tribune Tower. The city is also renowned for its museums, including the Art Institute and its expansive collections, including noted Impressionist works. Chicago has been named the city of the century and why not? After all the developments of this great city it deserved something like this. Invention is the creation of something new but what really matters for economic growth is innovation, the act through which the new inventions are successfully introduced.

I am an international student from Bangladesh. This is the first time I came to Chicago, in fact this is the first time I came to the United States and I came here since I got admitted to Illinois Institute of Technology. Before coming here I heard a lot about Chicago and the US since I have quite a few relatives living in the US. But hearing stories and experiencing the things for real is totally different. Since this is my first semester here I really did not know anything about Chicago so I thought taking this class would help me learn about the city and when my parents or relatives came here to visit I could show them around this wonderful city.

When I was back in my country the only things we would hear about the US was centrally from New York because almost every person who came to the US from our country would get settled there and also all the news that we heard was about NY. I never actually got to hear anything about Chicago except that it was freezing cold and it has a very high crime rate although I have a few relatives and friends here. But I am so glad that I was accepted to this University so that I could get a chance to live and know about this wonderful city of Chicago. There are a lot of things I learned about Chicago from this Global Chicago course. We visited some of the neighborhoods and got to learn about the different customs and cultures of the peoples living in different neighborhoods.

Chicago is full of immigrants from different countries and they have different customs and cultures. By going to these neighborhoods I got to see these different customs and cultures for myself. We visited neighborhoods like Bridgeport, Little Italy, Chinatown, Pilsen and Bronzeville, the neighborhood we live.

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So the first neighborhood we visited was Bridgeport and it was first populated by the Irish immigrants. The Irish settled in this area but it does not seem so now if you go there. Bridgeport is now populated by more Chinese people rather than Irish. In fact we did not see any Irish when we visited Bridgeport. This shows the change of culture and migration of people.

We visited Little Italy, the name gives the idea that it should be Italian and it is. Taylor Street is famous for its Italian Restaurants and they still have some Italians living in the neighborhood unlike Bridgeport.

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We visited Chinatown to get to see the Chinese customs and cultures. Chinatown is actually a place filled with Chinese people. There are various Chinese organizations and restaurants in Chinatown. Although they want people to visit their neighborhood you really don't feel welcome there yet people still go there to have Chinese food.

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Next we visited Pilsen. It is a predominantly Mexican neighborhood and it is famous for its murals. It is also a very crime prone neighborhood which is full of gangs. But the Mexican restaurants there are very good and if anyone wants good quality and authentic Mexican food then Pilsen is the place to go to.

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 By visiting all these neighborhoods we got to know about the cultures and customs of different immigrants living in different neighborhoods. Some of the people have integrated with the American culture but there are others who have stuck to their culture and did not integrate. By taking this course I got to analyze the assimilation, multiculturalism etc. of different ethnic groups and immigrants which I would not have if I did not take the course. From these neighborhood visits I got an idea of how diverse the people living in this city are.

The chart below show the races existing in Chicago over the years:

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Before taking this class what I thought was that Chicago should be a city full of white Caucasian people because this is a city in the US. When talking about the US in our country that is what we picture but coming here and seeing the different types of people living here gave me another type of perception. Even in our University we see a lot of diversity among the students as there are a lot of International Students coming here every year. I, myself, is an International Student so it should not be a surprise to me that there are so many International Students. Sometimes it doesn't feel like I'm in the US because the people around me are speaking different languages and most of them are Chinese. We learned about a lot of things in this class. We learned about racism, assimilation, multiculturalism, pluralism, the creative class etc. Racism has always been an issue in the US and in some parts of the country it still is. Even in Chicago racism still exists and it is a shame for the city.

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I had a slight idea about the crime and violence of the city but being here and hearing that you can't go to some parts of the city alone at night really makes me wonder. The crime rate is high in different neighborhoods and low in others and now there's some websites which allow people to see which type of crimes occur where and what time so that they can avoid that place. As US is a developed country this should not be the case, the crime rate should be negligible and all the places should be safe for general people at all times.

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As I mentioned earlier that our University is a host to a lot of International Students and so it is normal that in our classes the students are from various countries, ethnic groups and races. From my peers I learned about their cultures and traditions, we even students whose parents were immigrants. We had a class where a guest lecturer, Dr. Ntihigera, came and spoke about the African and other refugees in Chicago. From her lecture we learned about the African refugees and how hard their lives are. She told us to talk to our peers and learn how to greet people in our own culture and share it with each other. That was a really good experience and we learned how to greet different people in different countries or cultures.


Chicago is already a global Chicago and is ranked 7th in the global city rankings in the world.

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 From the above pyramid where Abraham Maslow shows the hierarchy of needs for the development of an individual which can be compared to that of a city. At first the physiological needs are to be met which is fulfilled in the city of Chicago. Then comes the safety, well Chicago is not the safest place in the world. The safety of the city has to improve in order to develop because no development will occur where people would be afraid to go to. After that the transportation and infrastructure of the city has to be improved. The problems Chicago has are road maintenance, broken bridges, no separate bus or cycle lanes on every road, no high speed trains and cta trains not covering all the parts of the city. To build a global city these infrastructural problems have to be fixed. After these comes the education and Chicago is doing pretty well in that sector as there are some world class Universities like UIC, Northwestern, IIT etc. in the city.

Business manufacture and industry is the next step on the way to being at the top. Chicago is doing pretty well in that sector too but there is always room for improvement. The main business area in Chicago is in the downtown area and the companies that exist are not bringing much innovations anymore. The way this can be improved is if the business industry is spread over different areas other than just the downtown area and new start up companies can help expand the business industry as well. Also another way to develop the business is to bring foreign delegations to the city so that they can start trade business with them and they might even want to start some of their businesses here.

Arts, Sports and Culture may as well be the thing that gives a city the most global attention. Chicago is the home to many famous celebrities like Michael Jordan, Oprah and having world famous stars gets global publicity. Also Chicago is famous for its sports team like the Cubs, Bulls, White Sox, Sky, Bears, and Hawks. These teams cover American favorite sports like basketball, football, baseball, and so on. Adding to that Chicago was a candidate to host the 2016 Olympics but Qatar got the chance instead. There are different events which are celebrated in Chicago like St. Patrick's Day (Irish Holiday), Annual Jazz Festival etc. which give the city a global attention. Chicago is also the home to many different museums. There are museums like National Museum of Mexican Art, Alder Planetarium, Chicago History Museum, National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame, Chinese American Museum of Chicago etc. These museums contains priceless artifacts of different cultures and countries which attracts people all around the world.

Development in all these sectors will result in the overall development of a city. The goals for the city of Chicago is to become a major North American transportation hub with diverse interconnected, intermodal systems; a center of research and education; committed to opening up assets and infrastructures for urban technology investment, sustainability, and experimentation; allow and encourage public access to data and a city of neighborhoods, each with its unique presence and opportunities. If all these goals are met then Chicago is bound to improve in the ranking of the global cities.