This book explores the impact of the Beat Generation on American culture, focusing on how writers like Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and Diane di Prima used urban settings—New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles—as stages for activism and social commentary, addressing crucial issues of gender, race, and class through their literature. Aimed at scholars, students, and American literature enthusiasts, this study offers a fresh perspective on the Beats’ agenda, emphasizing their unique blend of lifestyle, writing, and protest. By introducing the concept of “meta-manifest places”—a term that expresses the joint meanings of real, geographical space, its metaphoric depiction, and its ideological representation—the book follows the cartographies of the Beat writers to relay the importance of the people-place relationship and to reveal some insights into the lasting legacy of the Beat Generation in shaping modern urban culture.
