Mr. Rogers ' Neighborhood

Anderson makes a strong case for the inevitability of ghetto life--in other words, once "ghettoization" begins, it continues its course without regard to a neighborhood's tentative and transitory movement toward gentrification. The middle class and well-heeled whites and minority cultures who move into regenerating urban communities are attracted to city life for its vibrancy and "charm," yet they ultimately are playing with fire when it comes to sharing the same neighborhood which was formerly the turf of gangs, prostitutes, drug dealers, and other societal deviants. Such areas are frequently called "colorful," when they are, in fact, dangerous. Charm and color quickly turn to fear and suspicion after more than enough reports of car break-ins, gang retaliations, and drug deals gone bad fill the local news. As Anderson (1990) points out in his conclusion:

Experiencing further unstable environments, these children are forced to move from one foster home to another. They rarely develop meaningful relationships and constantly endure lack of care and protection by adults. Sabreen, another gifted student, was able to excel in school despite her unstable environments. She, too, became a ward of the county battling to find a stable home, constantly being placed in unstable environments, environments that do not encourage any achievement. When her situation becomes untenable, she goes AWOL, like Olivia, refusing to return to county supervision. Corwin masterfully frames the problem that wards, like Olivia and Sabreen, face when they feel that going back into the system is not an option. The additional struggles can be seen through Olivia and Sabreen accepting jobs with long hours in order to make enough to pay their bills. The responsibility on taking care of themselves financially detracts from their studies, which quickly can become a vicious, never-ending cycle.

There are some people part of a gang in the neighborhood like southside or O block. Who didn’t choose what they are right now. They wanted to be successful in their lives and they also wanted to achieve their goals but the atmosphere in those neighborhood wouldn’t allow them to be successful. In this article “Addicted to guns”, Chicago reader reporter Mick Dumke tells the story of Tony Wade.“Wade's grandfather did what he could to keep his grandson out of trouble—he sent Wade to Catholic schools, pushed him to excel in his studies, required him to attend church on Sundays, and taught him to work in his carpet business. Wade became a

In Always Running, Luis J. Rodriguez recalls his time growing up in Los Angeles during the 60s and 70s. Rodriguez writes of the hardships that his family had first encountered while trying to assimilate into American society and how he would often, while growing up, be criminalized by his teachers, law enforcement, other people, his peers, his community, and eventually people who cared most for him. Rodriguez recalls the times where he and some friends came together and created a family, a brotherhood of sort, in order to fulfill his need of belonging, but as other people in the community had also formed groups to consolidate power, thus marked the beginning of rivalry and the introduction of gangs. Rodriguez’s gang life had been filled with tragedies and filled with great times, but ultimately he tried to leave the life of crime and commit to an education. Rodriguez tried stepping away from the gang lifestyle by going to school and writing poetry, but ended up back in the life of crime after a serious altercation with the police. When Rodriguez went back to his gang lifestyle, he found the same gang that treated him as a brother, had shunned him away after Rodriguez had offered a solution to wither away the gang violence.

In this world, sometimes it is not what lays on top, open and blunt, that answers all of our questions. Sometimes it is the little things that we feel everyday. Rather it is tension that hovers between people in a neighborhood, or the unspoken words that are heard loud and clear. Sherman Alexie’s “Gentrification” uses humor and dialogue to show the underlying racism between blacks and whites in our everyday life and communities. There are many ways to show the underlying tension of racism in everyday, but in “Gentrification,” humor is carefully used.

Today we live in a society where it is acceptable for a white and black family to be neighbors, even close friends. This situation has not always been the case. During the 1950’s, the time that the Younger family was living in Chicago, whites and blacks were living completely separate lives and a majority of the blacks were living in poverty. Although there are significant improvements we have made, there are still things that remain the same. Many African Americans in Chicago today are still living in poverty, just like they were over 50 years ago. Two important changes have occurred during these years. Our race relations between whites and blacks have improved tremendously. Today it is completely acceptable for two different colored families to be living next door to each other. The second significant change is not as positive. The homicide rates per 100,000 people have gone up by almost 10 times the amount it was in the 50’s. Many sociologist believe that the cycle of multigenerational poverty causes violence in the mostly black communities, therefore raising the homicide rates. Even though as a city we have improved our race relations there are still problems such as the rising homicide rates and percent of people living in poverty.

While the population is diverse, the economic and class structure are not. The city is segregated amongst social and class lines that have caused conflict between the residence and the police force for some time (Inkeep, 2015). Because of these past interactions between the Baltimore citizens and police, the events pose sociological interests that are different from other recent riots and protests. In addition, the context is different because unlike past riots where ethnic race was a contributor, this riot was more about social injustice

Chapters 11 and 12 in “Not in My Neighborhood” deal with Edmonson Village, a quaint, Catholic and mainly white section of Baltimore. Nothing was out of place in Edmonson Village, with TV’s running schedules and businesses thriving. But the families in the houses would stay put, being the only owners most of the time. This would mean the entire generation borne from the times of segregation did not take kindly to African Americans trying to settle in. See, black people were being vastly mistreated. Living in slums and segregated from sanitary and adequate living. But after the Civil Rights Act is passed and separation of blacks and whites is outlawed, African Americans begin earning enough to live in better quality homes, and looking to more upscale parts of

In the film Thug Life in D.C was about the criminal justice system, neighbor that black inhabitants that give them no options in life, hope and no reason to care about what happening to them. The documentary follows a young man name Aundrey Burno who was awaits trial for attempted murder of a police officer and the murder of a teenager. Who talk about the southeast neighborhood he is from where he watching individuals get kill, sell drugs and rob. When his brother Kevin visit he would try to tell him to be better than me, don’t make the mistake that I have mad and “don’t die for no street because the street ain’t going to die for you.” However, his brother didn’t care for the reason that he started talking about his muscles and rapping about

Interviewee 3, Mrs. Homemaker, another native of Guyana, is a mother of four, and has happily relocated to South Ozone Park three years ago. Now that she’s been living there she says she doesn’t have any major complaints. She loves the neighborhood and so does her family. All of the neighbors look out for one another, and that’s one of the things she says she looks for in a neighborhood. Mrs. Homemaker tells me she sees no change in the crime in the area. The most she sees are fights and arguments among teenagers and young adults. She says this is only likely to occur when the weather’s nice, because that’s when everyone heads to the park so there’s a lot of people walking to and from passing by in front of her house. She has never seen any gangs or any type of criminal related activity in the neighborhood neither. There was another news story

Old people, working people, line ’em up, two by two. White cops will be standing on the walls with big poles pushing people back in.” The painful universal truth of this officer’s beliefs came back to me in stark relief during the flooding and destruction of New Orleans, Louisiana. Police in some neighboring communities prevented displaced black residents from leaving the disaster area, turning them away with blockades and guns.”

The movie Boyz N the Hood is an illustration of how a group of early adolescents’ lives was affected negatively due to the environment they lived in. These adolescents lived in an environment where drugs, gangs, and shootings were the center of their community. Living in a predominantly African American community these adolescents were faced with many misfortunes. Ricky one of the adolescent characters I have decided to evaluate for this particular paper was faced with adversity.

Within essay one, Black Men in Public Spaces by Brent Staples it describes the life and experiences of a young African American man living between Chicago and New York City over about a ten year span. Due to stereotypes on his race, society assumes he compliments them resulting in being viewed as dangerous

In the 1970’s a program named the “Safe and Clean Neighborhoods Program” was implemented in twenty-eight cities across the state of New Jersey. By taking police officers out of their patrol cars and into the neighborhoods, walking the beat, the program aimed to improve the wellbeing of communities as a whole. The effects of this program gave groundbreaking insight to the role law enforcement plays in providing the conformity necessary for a community to feel a sense of pride and security. The program also gave way to new understandings of how a community’s aesthetics can either discourage or entice criminal behavior. Ultimately, research following the enactment of the program provided a comprehensive look into the degression of a community’s safety as it becomes increasingly less respected by it’s inhabitants.

Forest Hills has diverse architectural styles and a large family-oriented population making it one of the best neighborhoods to settle in. It is a convenient (under half an hour) commute from Manhattan on the E, F, M or R subway line.