The American Underclass in In Life at the Bottom by Theodore Dalrymple

¨Gang members have been responsible for 61 percent of all homicides [in Chicago] in 2011, up from 58.7 percent in 2010¨ (Hidden America). These are some of the few disturbing statistics about gang violence in Chicago; however, as many people do not know, gangs have not always been about drugs and violence. In the early 19th century, gangs are not what people perceive them to be today. Gangs in the 19th century were volunteers with the fire department back in the Antebellum Period, which is the period before the civil war and after the War of 1812. As time went on and as the professional firemen forced the volunteers to break up, they started spreading apart. Then by the late 19th century, gangs started developing on the south side. This is

Gang incitation’s and gun violence are highest among African American youth. One study reported that African-Americans, future and current gang members, are most likely to own a gun. Gang-related homicides increased with the use of firearms, gang activities becoming more violent to include drug-related activities. Many of these young kids are often striving for respect from there fellow gang members and rivals so they are the ones often comminuting the crimes. They want to pay their tribute to the OG (original gangster) the problem with this is that at such a young age they don’t know how to react to a certain situation so they try to resolve everything with gun

James Loewen begins his argument by establishing that students are leaving high school without knowing the basic inner workings of the class structure. He goes on to attribute some of the ignorance concerning class structure to have stemmed from a lack of labor history and class system information in high school history books. Loewen continues to describe the shortcomings of history books on topics such as social stratification, the realities of social classes in colonial America, and social class inequalities. He then goes into great detail about the continuous inequalities between those in higher and lower social class. Overall, the author of this piece argues that a person's social class influences too many aspects of their life. He claims

Writer Gregory Mantsios in his article “Class in America”, talks about these things, and how wide the gap is between the rich and the poor and also discusses how the rich continue to get richer, while the poor continue to get poorer. Mantsios gives his readers the profiles and backgrounds of three hard-working Americans, two of them are white males, whose family background as well as education played a role in their success, while the other person is a black woman who is just above the poverty line despite her work as a nurse’s aide. Through these profiles, Mantsios article shows exactly how sex, race and shows how your parental and educational background of a person can play a role in the things that you achieve. Mantsios also talks about one’s performance in school and the level of school completed can suggest whether or not class that person may belong in.

In the study Lareau conducted, it can be see that working class and poor families differ slightly in that being poor means less resources and a means of a greater struggle for the child. The similarities found explain why being lower class has it benefits in some areas then if you were middle or upper class. Now Lareau is not telling people to raise their children one way or that being rich is better because even the rich have many disadvantages their children encounter. Lareau emphasizes, “Overall, daily life for working-class and poor children is slower paced, less pressured, and less structured than for their middle- and

Before I get into the strategies put in place to reduce gun violence, I want to touch on the things that contribute to gun violence in New Haven. According to the “Selected Strategies for Community Gun Violence Prevention” report, violent crimes contribute to and are exacerbated by economic disadvantage (City-Wide). The main area in New Haven where gun violence occurs is in areas of low-income and poverty and the gun violence are being executed by the youth ages 15-24. In this day and age, we are living in a society where your income level determines your life expectancy, whether it is homicide, suicide or another form of violent activity. Living in New Haven and experiencing this first hand, I was able to see how the power and the struggle of poverty, low-income, gang wars and even drug activity can exacerbate gun violence. New Haven has as many as 2,500 people who are in gangs. These gangs lie in six neighborhoods in New Haven. The gangs being, The Ville, The Tre, The Tribe, The Jungle, The Island and The Hill hold responsibility

There is no agreement or consensus reached on the proper definition of the term underclass. Furthermore, most researches have not determined the size of the underclass population, much less, on how the underclass population has changed over time. Most people assume that the term underclass implies a group of people who live in isolation, or are isolated from the rest of the society. Secondly, these kinds of persons (underclass) have low paying jobs and are not economically relevant, therefore, living in poverty conditions. Thirdly, these individuals (underclass) are characterised by social nonconformity, which has increased because of outmigration of the middle class people, who served as their mentors. There have been issues with the clear description of the underclass, as research done on the underclass comprises all individuals living in poverty or residing in poverty areas. Arguably, not all people living within a poverty residence are poor (Belina 20).

Chicago has the biggest gang problem in the country (Thomas & Bass, 2009). “There are more gang members per citizen in Chicago than anywhere else in the country” (Thomas, 2009, para 4). The average Chicago gang leader is 43, convicted of murder and lives in the suburbs. That leader on many occasions directs his gang from jail (Main, 2006) and 95 percent of inmates in the Cook County Jail are gang members (Thomas, 2009). Gangs are everywhere today just like they use to be. The high number of gangs causes violence and deaths to rise in Chicago.

The term became popular after Ken Auletta wrote Underclass. The essay linked “poverty” and “antisocial behavior” together as the characteristics of people who make up of the underclass. He stated that the people work in an “underground economy”.

Edward McClelland is a journalist, as well as the author of several other books. Young Mr. Obama: Chicago and the Making of a Black President (2010), was the latest published, in addition to the several articles that appear in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, and online sites such as, www.alternet.org. McClelland’s article, RIP, the Middle Class was first published on September 20, 2013, in Salon, an online news site. Having grown up in the midst of 1946-2013, Edward McClelland easily relates to that era. A time, when finding a well-paying job just out of high school was easily done. A time, when the Middle Class was still in existence.

In Theodore Dalrymple’s “Life at the Bottom” the psychiatrist states his own views in regards to the underclass in England and how their problems are not merely caused by where they reside. Throughout the collection of essays, Darlymple uses his patients and the people he has met as examples of other factors that play a role in what he refers to as their own “self-destruction”. One of the bigger reasons focused on in the book is the morals and views that the people of the underclass share. Another key player in the underclass’s struggles is not actually the underclass themselves but individuals in the higher class who write the problems of the lower class off and find excuses for them. These are the arguments Darlymple continually uses and

Although the book mainly focuses on the British underclass, many of the ideas and behaviors can be transpired to other cultures and demographics similar to those in the United States. The underclass makes up approximately 15% of Americas population, that’s an estimated 46.7 million people that make below the poverty threshold. According to an Article Hunger in America the result of underclass in America stem from operations of the political and economic systems in the United States and physical and behavioral issues among some people who are poor. This goes to say that Dalrymple's argument that the attitudes and behaviors of the poor have a direct effect

Social class is defined as 'people having the same social or economic status' (Wordnet). In contemporary American society, social class is based on the amount of money and property you have and also prestige. Prestige is given to a person through the line of work or the family that they come from. For example, upper-upper class member Jennifer Lopez reeks of prestige not only because she has millions of dollars in her bank account, but she has very expensive luxuries, cars, and houses.

For Gans (1991), the term “underclass” contains little intellectual substance. The term itself can hardly be agreed upon by anyone in the media or by social scientists. Naturally, the term is also used often for homeless people and all people living in poverty. It is ultimately a value-laden and pejorative buzzword for the “undeserving poor”. The meaning behind the term “underclass” has shifted over the years to refer to different things and ideas. For example, we have the term being used in the 1960’s to refer to an almost genetic “paradigm” under the term “culture of poverty,” first coined by Oscar Lewis, where the term covers a generational form of poverty that is passed on to the children of poor parents. Gans is adamant in denying this

The other reasons i think is because of lower education esteem in those areas and poorness,gang activities and drugs unlike other cities.As they said,violence in Chicago goes way back,Gangster life has already ruined many things and most of the people there say that nothing can change them.Some people say that they have