Geoffrey Canada does an excellent job of bringing his readers to the streets of the South Bronx and making them understand the culture and code of growing up in a poor, New York City neighborhood in the ‘50s and ‘60s. In his book, Fist, Stick, Knife, Gun, Canada details, through his own childhood experiences, the progression of violence in poverty plagued neighborhoods across America over the last 50 years. From learning to be “brave” by being forced to fight his best friend on a sidewalk at six-years-old, to staring down an enraged, knife wielding, “outsider” with nothing to defend himself but nerve, Canada explains the nightmare of fear that tens of thousands of children live through every day growing up in poor neighborhoods. The book …show more content…
It also means he understands what kind of help they need to break the cycle of violence. This knowledge has helped him to develop several “Beacon Schools”. These are charter schools that educate children during the day, with the guarantee that every child will get into college. They have extended school hours and offer courses that run in the summer. After hours, the buildings are used as community centers to help adults with parenting or life skills. The buildings are used for sports or martial arts classes (Canada is a sixth degree black belt in tae kwon do and continues to teach his own classes). These schools and centers have come out of an understanding that Canada and his staff, “have realized that you cannot save children without saving families, and you cannot save families without rebuilding communities” (Canada, 2010, ch. 20 para. 3). The philosophy requires an intense commitment to the program. Typically, the instructors and staff of the schools and centers are also people who have grown up in underprivileged neighborhoods and have a genuine understanding of the needs of these children and are willing to put in the extra time it takes to prevent failure. In both his autobiography and the docudrama, Waiting for Superman (2010), Canada’s Harlem Children’s
Introduction Anderson explores the concept of the street code and its relationship to violence in inner-city communities. Anderson argues that the street code is a set of social norms emphasizing toughness, respect, and the need to defend oneself and one's reputation, often through violence or the threat of violence. He suggests that the street code is deeply ingrained in the culture of many inner-city communities and is reinforced by media and popular culture that glamorize violence and aggression. Inner-City Neighborhoods and Families The article discusses how families in inner-city communities often hold values that are at odds with the street code, but struggle to navigate the challenges of living in violent neighborhoods.
Paul Beatty’s The White Boy Shuffle complicates the binary of the nonviolent and violent approaches to justice and instead suggests the creation of alternative paths to seek justice. The text engages with personal and social forms of justice. We can analyze the main character, Gunner Kaufman, to better understand how the text advocates for these alternatives. Although Gunner initiates violence in a dream sequence and in a truck driver scene, he does not cause harm to the victims, which complicates the previous binary of violence and nonviolence. Gunner advocates for gun use to seek justice for his fallen friend, while his gang uses alternative weapons, which endorses the creation of nontraditional avenues to justice.
The film focuses on public school failure and highlights the benefits of the charter school system. Diane Ravitch, an educational policy analyst and former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education, articulates her disapproval with the film in her piece, “The Myth of Charter Schools,” posted in The New York Review of Books. Ravitch spends much of her article discussing the documentary’s inconsistencies, faulty information, and general lack of fair analysis of the American public school system. In particular, she claims that the comparison between the charter and public school system in the film is unfair. Ravitch argues that Waiting for “Superman” is a misleading documentary that showcases incorrect statistics, hypocrisy, and promotion for what she believes to be the harmful privatization of
Jack Hunter’s “How Gun Control Kills” takes a more logical stance on the current issue of gun control. However, Hunter starts off using pathos, an appeal to emotion, and ethos, appealing to ethics. “Is there an evil worse than killing children?” Hunter asks in the opening paragraph. “Is there anything more heart-wrenching than the feeling of absolute helplessness in our inability to protect them?”
Hilliard suggests that “African American children need to learn languages and content other than that which they may have learned up until now” (Delpit, L., & Dowdy, K., 2002, p.91). This means that educators need to reevaluate teaching practice and the assessment process to fit the needs and promotes African American children’s culture experiences. Provide learning materials that compare their culture with other ethnicity and cultures. According to Darling (2010) “Both segregation of schools and inequality in funding has increased in many states over the past two decades, leaving a growing share of African-American and Hispanic students in highly segregated apartheid schools that lack qualified teachers;
Caleb Carr is an American author that writes fiction and nonfiction works in a variety of genres ranging from diplomatic and military history, historical thrillers, and terrorism. He was born on August 2 1955 in Manhattan New York in the Lower East side. He always had an interest in military history right from the time he attended St Luke’s School and Friends Seminary for his primary and secondary education respectively. He would later attend Kenyon College in Ohio from where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Military and Diplomatic History. Much of his fiction has the theme of violence by persons that were once victims of child abuse.
For countless families, this violence instilled immense fear in their hearts. Fear took over the lives of many people, but I decided that this situation would not stop me from living a normal life. When people asked me why I was still living in such a deadly city, I would simply respond that I loved my hometown. The city was going through a tough period, but it was up to its people to keep the city alive. We had to work as a community to rebuild what had been lost through violence.
The novel “Scarborough” by Catherine Hernandez utilizes different perspectives to display the struggles civilians face in the east district of Toronto. This novel revolves around the author's own personal experiences giving readers a realistic depiction of the living conditions found in the community. One may believe the main message of the novel “Scarborough” is how there will always be support for you even if you don't realize it right away. Throughout the entire novel, the characters constantly support each other in simple ways demonstrating the community's altruism. Whether the characters realize it or not, they always have someone in their life that is willing to help them through stressful times.
Elijah Anderson, a Yale professor, developed the concept or theory entitled the “code of the street” which explains the reasoning for high rates of street violence among African-American juveniles in a Philadelphia community. The “code of the street” is the way of life for many living in poverty-stricken communities which attempt to regulate behaviors. Anderson observed that juveniles in inner-city neighborhoods who are exposed to racial discrimination, economic disadvantages and alienation from mainstream society may lead violent behavior. The strain, social learning, and labeling theories are all directly related to Anderson’s work.
He believes that wit has a place in the classroom. That schools prepare children to become good workers as adults, rather than good
Purpose and Focus: The purpose and main point of chapter one of Hope and Healing in Urban Education are that youth in low-income environments need extra hope and attention in order to succeed. Shawn Ginwright explains that while it may be difficult to reach these communities, it’s a worthwhile investment of time and resources to improve them. Ginwright uses personal examples of people who have been affected by the struggle of living in a crime-ridden and low-income neighborhood in San Francisco. The eldest sibling examined, Tanya, a community organizer suffered the loss of her younger brother, who was murdered while he was visiting her on holiday from college.
Ameena Matthews, Ricardo “Cobe” Williams, and Eddie Bocanegra display the courage to express agape love for their communities. People living in these distressed communities on the Southside of Chicago have the mentality that when they have a grievance with someone, that grievance justifies the violence they commit against another individual. During the documentary, someone mentioned that violence is an infectious disease that consumes people; the behavior is bad, not the people. Also, violence is seen as the only way to reclaim credibility; they rather face death instead of dishonor. However, violence interrupters encourage those who seek vengeance to find it in their hearts to forgive and empower them to have the courage to love.
Living in the East Vancouver, I have grown to be aware of people who seem dangerous. I live in a contrasting neighbourhood of wealth and poverty, just like in the essay where “Hyde
Most of the children in Little’s AP class has a dark background. For example, coming from a childhood full violence or sexual abuse. But even that kind of obstacle shouldn’t stop you from succeeding in getting an education. Through the book, “And Still We Rise: The Trials and Triumphs of Twelve Gifted Inner-City Students” Corwin has showed the audience that no matter where you are or where you are from, you can always succeed in
The New and Lonesome Normal Joyce Oates’s “Hi Howya Doin” depicts the violence that has captured and encapsulated today’s culture. The un-deemed murder of an innocent jogger in the end of this story validates and justifies the fear that so many individuals feel. In Oates’s short story, “Hi Howya Doin”, the protagonist is depicted as a “Good-looking husky guy six-foot-four in the late twenties or early thirties, Caucasian male…..solid built as a fire hydrant, carries himself like an athlete, or an ex-athlete” (214). Through the police report, giving the description of the protagonist, Oates foretells his surprising fate at the beginning of the story which in turn, creates tension and suspense for the reader as the protagonist goes about what