Gang Leader for a Day
A Rogue Sociologist Takes To The Streets
(Sprache: Englisch)
Recounts the full story of a young sociologist whose infiltration of a Chicago drug gang was originally introduced in the work Freakonomics, in a firsthand account that describes the author's grad student idealism, his friendship with gang leader JT, and...
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Recounts the full story of a young sociologist whose infiltration of a Chicago drug gang was originally introduced in the work Freakonomics, in a firsthand account that describes the author's grad student idealism, his friendship with gang leader JT, and his seven-year witness to the organization's complex crack-selling trade.
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First introduced in Freakonomics , here is the full story of Sudhir Venkatesh, the sociology grad student who infiltrated one of Chicago's most notorious gangsThe story of the young sociologist who studied a Chicago crack-dealing gang from the inside captured the world's attention when it was first described in Freakonomics . Gang Leader for a Day is the fascinating full story of how Sudhir Venkatesh managed to gain entrance into the gang, what he learned, and how his method revolutionized the academic establishment.
When Venkatesh walked into an abandoned building in one of Chicago's most notorious housing projects, he was looking for people to take a multiple-choice survey on urban poverty. A first-year grad student hoping to impress his professors with his boldness, he never imagined that as a result of the assignment he would befriend a gang leader named JT and spend the better part of a decade inside the projects under JT's protection, documenting what he saw there.
Over the next seven years, Venkatesh got to know the neighborhood dealers, crackheads, squatters, prostitutes, pimps, activists, cops, organizers, and officials. From his privileged position of unprecedented access, he observed JT and the rest of the gang as they operated their crack-selling business, conducted PR within their community, and rose up or fell within the ranks of the gang's complex organizational structure.
In Hollywood-speak, Gang Leader for a Day is The Wire meets Harvard University. It's a brazen, page turning, and fundamentally honest view into the morally ambiguous, highly intricate, often corrupt struggle to survive in what is tantamount to an urban war zone. It is also the story of a complicated friendship between Sudhir and JT-two young and ambitious men a universe apart.
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Table of ContentsTitle Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Foreword
PREFACE
ONE - How Does It Feel to Be Black and Poor?
TWO - First Days on Federal Street
THREE - Someone to Watch Over Me
FOUR - Gang Leader for a Day
FIVE - Ms. Bailey's Neighborhood
SIX - The Hustler and the Hustled
SEVEN - Black and Blue
EIGHT - The Stay-Together Gang
AUTHOR'S NOTE
Acknowledgements
INDEX
About the Author
ALSO BY SUDHIR VENKATESH
Off the Books:
The Underground Economy of the Urban Poor
American Project:
The Rise and Fall of a Modern Ghetto
THE PENGUIN PRESS
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A. Penguin Group
(Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of
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Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published in 2008 by The Penguin Press,
a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
Copyright © Sudhir Venkatesh, 2008
All rights reserved
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Venkatesh, Sudhir Alladi.
Gang leader for a day : a rogue sociologist takes to the streets / Sudhir Venkatesh.
p. cm.
Includes index.
eISBN : 978-1-594-20150-9
1. Gangs-Illinois-Chicago. 2. African Americans-Illinois-Chicago.
3. Chicago
... mehr
(Ill.)-Social conditions. 4.Venkatesh, Sudhir Alladi. I. Title.
HV6439.U7C46 2008
364.1'0660977311-dc22
2007040170
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrightable materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.
To Autry Harrison
FOREWORD
Stephen J. Dubner
I believe that Sudhir Venkatesh was born with two abnormalities: an overdeveloped curiosity and an underdeveloped sense of fear.
How else to explain him? Like thousands upon thousands of people, he entered graduate school one fall and was dispatched by his professors to do some research. This research happened to take him to the Robert Taylor Homes in Chicago, one of the worst ghettos in America. But blessed with that outlandish curiosity and unfettered by the sort of commonsensical fear that most of us would experience upon being held hostage by an armed crack gang, as Venkatesh was early on in his research,
HV6439.U7C46 2008
364.1'0660977311-dc22
2007040170
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrightable materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.
To Autry Harrison
FOREWORD
Stephen J. Dubner
I believe that Sudhir Venkatesh was born with two abnormalities: an overdeveloped curiosity and an underdeveloped sense of fear.
How else to explain him? Like thousands upon thousands of people, he entered graduate school one fall and was dispatched by his professors to do some research. This research happened to take him to the Robert Taylor Homes in Chicago, one of the worst ghettos in America. But blessed with that outlandish curiosity and unfettered by the sort of commonsensical fear that most of us would experience upon being held hostage by an armed crack gang, as Venkatesh was early on in his research,
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Inhaltsverzeichnis zu „Gang Leader for a Day “
Gang Leader for a Day Foreword by Stephen J. DubnerPreface
One: How Does It Feel to be Black and Poor?
Two: First Days on Federal Street
Three: Someone to Watch Over Me
Four: Gang Leader for a Day
Five: Ms. Bailey's Neighborhood
Six: The Hustler and the Hustled
Seven: Black and Blue
Eight: The Stay-Together Gang
Author's Note
Acknowledgments
Index
Autoren-Porträt von Sudhir Venkatesh
Sudhir Venkatesh is professor of sociology and African American Studies at Columbia University in New York. He has written extensively about American poverty. He is currently working on a project comparing the urban poor in France and the United States. His writings, stories, and documentaries have appeared in The American Prospect , This American Life , the Source , and on PBS and National Public Radio.
Bibliographische Angaben
- Autor: Sudhir Venkatesh
- 2008, 320 Seiten, Maße: 16,7 x 24,2 cm, Gebunden, Englisch
- Verlag: Penguin US
- ISBN-10: 1594201501
- ISBN-13: 9781594201509
- Erscheinungsdatum: 18.01.2008
Sprache:
Englisch
Pressezitat
" Gang Leader for a Day is not another voyeuristic look into the supposedly tawdry, disorganized life of the black poor. Venkatesh entered the Chicago gang world at the height of the crack epidemic and what he found was a tightly organized community, held together by friendship and compassion as well as force. I couldn't stop reading, and ended up loving this brave, reckless young scholar, as well as the gang leader J.T., who has to be one of the greatest characters ever to emerge from something that could be called sociological research." -- Barbara Ehrenreich " Gang Leader for a Day is an absolutely incredible book. Sudhir Venkatesh's memoir of his years observing life in Chicago's inner city is a book unlike any other I have read, equal parts comedy and tragedy. How is it that a naòve suburban kid ends up running a crack gang (if only for a day) on his way to becoming one of the world's leading scholars? You have to read it to find out, but heed this warning: don't pick up the book unless you have a few hours to spare because I promise you will not be able to put it down once you start." --Steven D. Levitt, co-author, Freakonomics "This extraordinary book features the fascinating research of a brilliant young sociologist. Sudhir Venkatesh spent several years closely interacting with crack-selling gang members and struggling poor residents in a large and very dangerous public housing project in Chicago. His riveting portrait of day-to-day life in this poor community, including the challenges confronting parents in a drug-infested and violent social environment, is disturbing. But, Gang Leader for a Day is rich with original information and insights on poor families, drug dealers and even the police. It will leave an indelible impression on readers." ---William Julius Wilson, Harvard University Lewis P. and Linda L. Geyser Professor "Whether you enjoy fiction, history, or biography you'll be drawn to Venkatesh's gripping retelling of his experiences in the Robert
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Taylor Homes. Gang Leader for a Day poignantly reminds us that there continue to be separate and unequal Americas that ultimately impact us all." --Congressman Jesse L. Jackson, Jr. (D-IL)
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