Blair A. Ruble is the author of several books about the governance of cities worldwide, including Creating Diversity Capital: Transnational Migrants in Montreal, Washington, and Kyiv and Second Metropolis: Pragmatic Pluralism in Gilded Age Chicago, Silver Age Moscow, and Meiji Osaka, also published by Johns Hopkins and the Woodrow Wilson Center. Ruble is director of the Kennan Institute and of the Comparative Urban Studies Program at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

When most people think of Washington, D.C., pictures of marble steps and monuments fill their mind's eyes, but beyond the Federal District lives a vital and equally historic collection of neighborhoods and stories. This week on dialogue host John Milewski is joined by Blair Ruble to discuss his latest book, which traces the history of the U Street neighborhood from its Civil War–era origins to its recent gentrification and which continues to be a critical zone of contact between black and white America.