Ponce de Leon Avenue connects many major cities including, Atlanta, Decatur, Clarkston, and Stone Mountain. While at first glance it seems like merely a road, Ponce de Leon Avenue has direct ties to racism and classism. Depending on the direction that one is travelling, road names change once they cross over Ponce. When driving near Druid Hills, an affluent neighborhood, State Route 42 is called Briarcliff Road. Once Briarcliff Road passes over Ponce de Leon Ave, it changes to Moreland Avenue. Similarly, when it intersects with Ponce, and enters a poorer neighborhood, Monroe Drive turns into Boulevard. Once again, Juniper turns into Courtland and Argonne Avenue transforms into Central Park Place. While these changes are no doubt confusing for those driving in Atlanta, there is a reason attributed to the change.

Affluent white people moved to north Atlanta and created neighborhoods they wanted to keep separated from minorities and the lower class. In order to keep the wealthy and lower classes separated, officials changed the names of north-south roads. This way wealthy white home owners were appeased, because they did not live on the same streets as lower class minorities.

Charles Dickens incorporates themes of class disparity throughout much of his writing. The changing of road names after they pass through Ponce de Leon Avenue parallels a lot of Dickens’s writing in ​Bleak House. ​Jo’s character, a poor child who lives on the street and sweeps the streets of Chancery, demonstrates class differences in ​Bleak House​. The people in the houses that Jo sweeps in front of and those experiencing homelessness all live on the same street. However, those with wealth are able to feel separated from the lower class by living in houses. This parallels the Ponce de Leon Avenue situation because, in an attempt to be separated from the lower class, affluent people changed the names of roads so they would not live on the same road as poorer people. Class differences are obvious in both situations, because members of the higher class and lower class live in close proximity, whether that be on opposite ends of a road or some in houses and others on streets.

While Charles Dickens criticizes class differences, he fails to bring attention to racism. In Atlanta, road names were changed when they crossed Ponce de Leon Avenue because of class distinction and racism. The people who were wealthy enough to live in north Atlanta were white, which brings attention to systematic racism and the reasons why minorities were forced into the lower class. In ​Bleak House,​ Dickens does not include the ways that minorities are further oppressed by racism and monetary policies. As Dickens writes in ​Bleak House, “​dead, men and women, born with Heavenly compassion in your hearts. And dying thus around us, every day” (575). Like members of the upper class in ​Bleak House​, wealthy white people in the Atlanta-metro area were able to ignore their proximity to the lower class by self creating a degree of separation that wasn't truly there.

Works Cited

Dickens, Charles. ​Bleak House​, edited by Patricia Ingham, Broadview Press, 2011.

“Why do Street Names Change at Ponce.” ​Atlanta Magazine. ​25 November 2019,https://www.atlantamagazine.com/list/you-asked-we-answered-34-things-you... w-about-atlanta/why-do-street-names-change-at-ponce​. Accessed 19 November 2020.