Yo, Improper Bostonian! Is that really all you found?

Normally I enjoy the Improper Bostonian and look forward to reading what's new and interesting around town. I also generally think they put together one of the better Best of Boston lists, better even than Boston Magazine's. This year's edition of the Improper's Boston's Best list, however, was seriously lacking in geographic and ethnic diversity. Couldn't they find anything else going on in Chinatown, JP, Dorchester, and the South End other than restaurants and bars? Each of those neighborhoods has large concentrations of Latinos and Asians, but you'd hardly know it by their choice of categories and the winners. And what of Roxbury, Mattapan, and East Boston? As far as I can tell, those neighborhoods weren't even included or considered as the panel did its survey.

I'm not begrudging the winners for their placement in the magazine. Boston has many, many exceptional restaurants, bars, arts venues, and entertainment options. But, even if I were to concede that not a single establishment in the "outer" neighborhoods was able to compete on a citywide basis, wouldn't there at least be some way to acknowledge that there are quality options in all of the neighborhoods? Given that some of the categories are neighborhood bars and neighborhood restaurants, where are the entries from East Boston, Roxbury, and Mattapan?

Just using Roxbury as an example, Merengue, Haley House, The Savant Project, and Ashur would have been some of the eateries that could've been judged for best neighborhood restaurant. Brigham Circle also has enough bars to give the reviewers something for the neighborhood bar category. Considering how overlooked Roxbury is most of the time anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if the panel found tons to consider for the best-kept secret category, too. How many of them know about the Shirley-Eustis House or the Museum of the National Center of Afro-American Artists?

Again, this isn't to say that the winners don't deserve their spots in the sunshine. But this collection of recommendations doesn't even begin to cover the full breadth of diversity that exists in Boston. I suspect that the choice of categories is one of the underlying reasons, as well as the need to satisfy advertisers. Still, how would this list look if it included additional categories like best soul food, Dominican food, African-American history tour, Latin music & dance venue, Asian cultural resource (the magazine only mentions food), Caribbean festival, neighborhood tour (most neighborhoods including Chinatown, JP, Roxbury, and Dorchester have them), and neighborhood arts venue?

I'm hoping that their August 12th Neighborhoods issue will be more inclusive, although I believe that I'm going to be disappointed again. I sent a letter to the editor last week and followed up with a voice message encouraging him to include Roxbury in the neighborhoods issue. Both messages referred to the Roxbury Cultural Network, which I hope he will use as a resource. Let's see if he sends someone out to do some legwork. With the Roxbury Film Festival, Discover Roxbury's high tea at the Shirley-Eustis House, and Berklee's Jazz at the Fort coming up, there are a variety of options on the table for the Improper to learn something new about one of the "outer" neighborhoods and add it to their body of knowledge.

For those of you who would also like to contact the editor to encourage him to expand the magazine's horizons, contact Andrew Rimas at andrew@improper.com or 617-859-1400. Please leave positive messages and constructive criticism that reflects the true quality and character of our communities.

Full disclosure: The Third Decade works at Discover Roxbury, a member of the Roxbury Cultural Network.

Comments

[Boston Mamas]

Thanks for this thoughtful post (found you via UH. I heard about the list release yesterday and was going to check out the issue, but man, this doesn't sound like good motivation to pick up a copy (according to Adam at UH, they don't even have the list on their site).

I understand it's challenging to put together any "best of" list and you ultimately miss some awesomeness, but it's distressing when you get a deep sense that the staff has not done their homework.

-Christine

[Bob Pomeroy]

Just a random comment about the reference to "high tea". High Tea is the term for the evening meal, typically cold meat at the end of the working day. The "high" refers to the height of the table (either a higher dinner table or standing up).

The proper term is "Afternoon Tea". See Wikipedia for more info.

Ok, off my high (tea) horse.

BTW, good post on the "Best Of" list.

[3D]

Christine, I don't think it's a matter of the staff not doing their homework. I think they allowed themselves to be limited by their own imaginations. After reading where many of them worked (hotels and ajor restaurants), they're all more or less part of the same downtown crowd patting themselves on the back and throwing a bone to parts of the neighborhoods.

Bob, thanks for the correction. We all need additional education from time to time.

[Adam Gaffin]

An idea: Since this seems to be a common problem among "Best of" lists (also, tourist guides), why don't we do a "Best of the rest of Boston" (with a better name). Come up with some categories, limit it to specific neighborhoods (south of Fenway, north of the Harbor, say) and open it up to voting.

[3D]

Adam, that's a cool idea! Do you see this being as formally organized as the Improper's or more like an online poll with nominations and voting?

[Jen]

I think it is all too common. I have seen several websites that think only of "hip" areas and ignores half of the city or it is only Downtown and Cambridge...

[MC Slim JB]

The 2009 Improper Best-Of is decent of its kind

Historically, I haven't been a fan of the Improper's annual best-of list, as it's usually too full of suspect choices, lulus that make you certain they're collecting graft from advertisers. But the 2009 edition is pretty good from a restaurant perspective: I don't see a whole lot of Phantom Gourmet-like whoring to sponsors. They get a lot right, and even when I disagree with their choices for "best", I don't think they're ridiculously far off.

It's true that there's not enough emphasis on cheap-eats kind of places, and that many worthy neighborhoods get largely overlooked; this is a problem with many publications' coverage of Boston restaurants. I know I don't spend as much time as I should writing about restaurants in Roxbury, Dorchester, Roslindale, and West Roxbury, but I'm working on it.

[Adam Gaffin]

It could be a two-step process: First we come up with the categories and ask for suggestions for entrants. Then we put those up to a vote.

[3D]

We should probably get a decent-sized group involved to come up with the categories.

Would you be willing to host the various stages of polling on UH?

[Karen Zgoda]

Count me and my blog in for the "Best of the rest of Boston!"

[Can-Can]

This is where having a publication like the Banner would be helpful. If Improper won't take this "best of the rest of Boston" perhaps another paper or organization could do it. As you well know, Roxbury is located in the center of the city and is rich in history, architecture, social activism, etc. It's simply lazy for the editors of these publications not to look beyond their narrow worlds to report on the whole city. Great post.