Gang Leader For A Day Summary

In the book, Gang Leader for a Day, a rogue sociologist passionately dives into the lives of one of Chicago’s toughest housing projects in an attempt to develop an insight as to how the urban impoverished lived. Throughout the text it becomes clear that a conflict paradigm is being reflected. A conflict society is based on social inequality, in which some individuals benefit and thrive more than others, which tends to lead to conflict and thus change. This is evident both in the housing projects where a gang known as the “Black Kings” take over and also in the surrounding neighborhoods where the more elite citizens, including persons from the authors university, shy away from associating with the nearby poor black nearby public, thus

In the book, Gang Leader for a Day by Sudhir Venkatesh, a sociology student from the University of Chicago starts out simply trying to understand “how it feels to be poor and black,” and ends up spending years and years figuring out the ins and outs of a gang society (Venkatesh 14). Sudhir receives the chance of a sociologist’s lifetime to see first-hand what life is like in the projects. He follows gang leader, J.T. around and studies his life at the Robert Taylor homes for years. Throughout Venkatesh’s experience he witnesses many things some people go a lifetime without seeing. For example, he was no stranger to seeing people use drugs or get beat up by gang members. One interesting aspect of Venkatesh’s experiment

In chapter 5 in the novel Gang Leader for a Day by Sudhir Venkatesh he writes about his experience of how he began to tag along with Ms. Bailey more often. Venkatesh says the more time he would spend with her, the more he would understand her work ethics and why she is so important to the community. Since Venkatesh was spending more time with Ms. Bailey he began to help her with food drives and food donations in the community as well as go to meetings that she would run. Venkatesh says the reason that Ms. Bailey was helping the housing projects, community and their building was because it was low on clothing and food for the winter. This portion of the novel teaches us about how many people out there have needs and the altruism in the way some

At the start of the movie, there are two of the many gangs in the five points prepping for a brawl to see who would control the five points. Amsterdam Vallon walks with his father, the leader of the Dead Rabbits Gang, to Paradise square where the brawl would take place. Bill “The Butcher” Cutting, the leader of the Bowery Boys, leads his gang to the square. The fight ensues Bill has eventually killed Priest Vallon which ensured that the Bowery boys would control five points. Amsterdam is sent away, he returns years later from prison. He wants revenge for his father’s death years earlier, he knows he has to defeat Bill from the inside so he joins Bill as his assistant. Amsterdam falls for smart thief Jenny. Amsterdam tries to kill Bill, but fails and is wounded by Bill. Jenny nurses him back to health. Amsterdam publicly announces his return to five points by hanging a dead rabbit in the square, Bill sends a gang member to investigate and is killed by Amsterdam and hung in the square. In vengeance, Bill beats Johnny and puts him on a pike in the square forcing Amsterdam to put down suffering Johnny. Amsterdam challenges Bill to a duel in the square just as a riot breaks out, and the military is sent in to control the rioters, Bill is wounded from cannon shrapnel. Amsterdam kills Bill, Amsterdam then leaves with Jenny and they move together to San Francisco.

The book, Gang Life in Two Cities by Robert J. Durán to put simply is about the gang life in Denver, CO and Ogden, UT. Durán wrote this book to share his research findings. When Durán had to move to Huntsville, UT (but went to school in Ogden) he found himself immersed in an area where gangs were becoming popular. Durán, an ex-gang member himself was curious on how and why gangs operate. He found this research important, because he saw firsthand how society had a role in the formation of gangs. Duran felt that it needed to be brought to light what he witnessed while being a gang member himself and when he conducted his research.

The Central Park Five is a documentary by Ken Burns about five young black men who were wrongfully convicted of a crime they did not commit. This documentary focused on showing how these boys got convicted, why they got convicted, the effects and response from the public of their convictions, and their release. For the remaining part of my paper, I am going to show how the sociological theoretical perspectives, in particular the conflict perspective, explains why the events in the film happened the way they did. The three major parts of the conflict theory that I am going to be focusing on relates to how the people with wealth and power has a major influence in society and how they went about abusing that power that was given to them. I am

The majority of black communities in 1989 were among the poorest neighbourhoods in Chicago. Approximately 20% of black people were unemployed, compared to only 5.4% of unemployed white people (Street,2007). These statistics represent racial inequality which caused a lot of internal, and external damage to the black population. Rogue Sociologist, Sudhir Venkatesh’s (2008) novel called Gang Leader for a Day, reveals this disparity. In 1989 Sudhir participated in qualitative research, by studying the lives of people from the projects of Chicago. The projects are a subsidized housing development, provided by the government which requires low rent. Sudhir’s research is unique because it provides knowledge, that just statistics could not give. Also it portrays social disorganization in the community, specifically, the Robert Taylor Homes. Shaw and McKay’s social disorganization theory is that crime increases when poverty, ethnic diversity, and constant moving of houses, leads to social disorganization in the community (Sampson&Groves,1989). This paper will discuss how the Robert Taylor Homes support the social disorganization theory, due to an unstable family life, and poor economic conditions. Following, this paper will discuss the ways in which the community challenged disorganization, because of the homogenous population, and lack of mobility.

In the Foreword to the book, written by Stephen J. Dubner, the writer claims that Venkatesh was born with "two abnormalities: an overdeveloped curiosity and an underdeveloped sense of fear" (Dubner, 2008, xi). That is an exaggeration of course but the truth a reader finds out is that indeed Venkatesh is basically an investigative person and he puts fear aside to enable his entry into a Chicago gang. The book shows, "Day by day and dollar by dollar, how the crack dealers, tenant leaders, prostitutes, patents, hustlers, cops, and Venkatesh himself" attempt to build a decent life from ""¦substandard materials" (Dubner, xii).

CH. 1- Characters 1 's Name: Sudhir Venkatesh. Sudhir is Indian, he was born lived in California. He walks into the projects and stays overnight with a gang even though he knows he doesn 't fit in.

I really enjoyed the article Gang Leader for a Day: Adventures of a Rogue Sociologist, however I found it unclear on exactly what Sudhir Venkatesh was researching exactly. The article never explains exactly what it was that Sudhir was going into “the projects” to study other than expressing his question to the few individuals that he encountered which was “ How does it feel to be black and poor?” I would have liked to know his precise purpose in going into such a dangerous area only to ask how it felt for the African American and poor when there are other areas I am sure that contain individuals who are under the poverty level and African American in safer areas. Sudhir’s objective was very unclear and I wonder if his choice to go to this location

The third chapter continues as Beli is at the bar and goes out of control in dancing before a man named “The Gangster” comes. Narrator tells us this man will steal Belis heart. At their first interaction, Beli gets mad and leaves but the following days she cannot stop thinking about him. Beli and her friend go back to the club where Beli dances with the man.

Decision making is to do something, to be something, to behave a certain way and a judgment about someone or something. Meaning making is the process in which we make these decisions. Such as, what have our life experiences been; where have we come from. Throughout Sudhir Venkatesh, “Gang Leader for a Day”, he shows how different people have made decisions. People like the police, the gang members, parents with young children, Ms. Bailey, JT, and even Sudhir himself. People often told Sudhir how much he had to learn or often thought of him as naive for not realizing what was going on or how his actions had affected people.

Directed by the legendary director Martin Scorsese, along with splendid performances of the duo Leonardo DiCaprio and Daniel Day - Lewis, Gangs of New York is an excellent film illustrated the chaotic peril of 1860s New York City based on actual historical events. Build upon the nonfiction novel by Herbert Asbury, The Gangs of New York: An Informal History of the Underworld, the movie depicted the conflict between the Americans and the Irish immigrants due to the rising wave of immigration to America. Although the movie is overall very intriguing, and gave an in-depth insight into the modern gang of New York City in the 19th century, it omits certain events in history for the purpose of entertainment.

The book “Gang Leader for a Day” by Sudhir Venkatesh is and interesting insight into the life of a gang member, as well as people who live in the projects. When reading this book, several sociological things stood out to me, however three things really captured my mind. Those included social class differences, racial discrimination, and power conflict theory.

You’re a graduate student at the University of Chicago and you’re pursuing your degree in sociology. You’ve been going to seminars and they do not seem to be doing anything for you. You want to get to the root of problems. You go searching for answers and you find them in the office of a professor. Still there seems to be something missing and you go looking for it. This is what Sudhir Venkatesh goes through. As a rogue sociologist, Venkatesh struggled with changing a research project, getting information from a gang, and the ethical issues that came with the research that he was conducting with African Americans that were part of said gang. By using the ethnography method, conducting interviews, and getting to know the people that were part of the gang, Venkatesh was able to have an advantage over other researchers that just did questionnaires to get answers.