The tensions caused by rapid neighborhood change were already simmering when the language-learning technology company Duolingo Inc. arrived in the East Liberty neighborhood of Pittsburgh in 2016, but it only got worse from there.
Moving from another part of Pittsburgh, Duolingo became a tenant in a building that had just painted over a mural called “Lend Me Your Ears,” depicting Black and brown children at play. It was a widely celebrated work of public art that caused a community uproar when it was covered with a solemn coat of gray paint. Residents of East Liberty, once one of Pittsburgh’s premier Black neighborhoods, were already reeling from recent demolition of low-income housing, and with new luxury apartments moving into the area, many took the paint-over as a sign that they, too, were facing erasure.
