The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“We think of street addresses as purely functional and administrative tools, but they tell a grander narrative of how power has shifted and stretched over the centuries.”

This passage serves as the thesis statement for The Address Book. Deidre Mask argues that street addressing systems are neither neutral nor merely practical in nature, but are instead a “grander narrative of [. . .] power” that can reveal forms of inequality and various forms of communal identity. These issues will be explored at length throughout the book.

“The traffic in Kolkata is so terrible that the government recently started an initiative to play calming music, blasted so loudly over speakers that you can apparently hear it from inside an air conditioned car.”

This passage is indicative of Mask’s use of sensory details to immerse her reader into her experience in India. The sights, sounds, smells, and feeling of the Kolkata slums are essential to Mask’s storytelling, reflecting her use of the techniques of Creative Nonfiction (See: Background) and illustrating the lived experience of the slum’s residents. The reference to air conditioning, a luxury in the Indian climate, is also an acknowledgement of Mask’s privilege as a visitor to the slums.

“One of Hope’s employees, for example, had correlated the number of boys in a family with household income and school dropouts, to search out areas of high child labor.”

Here, Mask offers concrete evidence of the ways in which formalizing street addresses can increase access to social services. By comparing census records to school lists, workers for an NGO called the Hope Foundation were able to identify boys who had dropped out of school to work and support their families. This kind of targeted research allows governments to allocate funds and services where they are most needed.