Leoalan Sociology

Kozol goes on to discuss how there are several schools in urban areas that are made up of primarily black and Hispanic students. These schools usually bear the name of people who worked hard to achieve integration, such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Thurgood Marshall. What is even more upsetting is that cities are the most racially diverse areas; the parents of white children go out of their way to avoid these public schools and therefore prevent integration. Kozol points out how media tends to

Wes Moore the author and other Wes Moore both experienced difficult childhoods. For the most part, their difficulties seemed to stem from choices that they made or choices other people made that affected them. As the book presented the situations, a lot of their problems seemed to be a result of choices rather than something like systemic racism, which is the opposite of what the video of the professor claimed. (WIVB) School seemed to be the only thing that could be considered a structural issue, yet they both skipped very regularly from a young age and never even gave it a real chance. They both lived in neighborhoods that were not the greatest, and even when their mothers moved them to different neighborhoods, they still found their way back to the “bad” parts of the city.

financial issues, segregation, subtractive schooling, and the overall school climate may negatively impact their overall performance. Jay MacLeod brings to light these issues in his book, Ain’t No Makin’ It: Aspirations and Attainment in a Low-Income Neighborhood. The book, which reports the author’s findings on fifteen boys living in public housing and their overall educational and life success over several years. The book centered around the achievement ideology, which is the belief that success can only be obtained through hard work and education (MacLeod, 2009). Under this belief, factors such as race and socioeconomic status do not impact one’s success

“In the inner city it is not uncommon to find a twelve-year-old who cannot read. In some gang-infested neighborhoods in California, only one in twenty high school students can do grade-level math or english.” This quote is from the book If I Grow by Todd Strasser it is about a young boy named DeShawn that has to live in the ghettos of Chicago and he has many choices to make. The ghettos that he lives in are full of gangs, drug lords, alcoholics, and just bad people. DeShawn at first is one of the good people.

Urban schools are interpreted as the low income institutions with horribly irresponsible students. Bulman explains that Hollywood does not give these schools any justice by labeling them as the as the middle’s worse nightmare (43). Even though Bulman believes that real American urban schools are taking a turn for the worst, Hollywood adds benefiting factors to increase the chances for these students to

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:

     In Savage Inequalities, Jonathan Kozol documents the devastating inequalities in American schools, focusing on public education’s “savage inequalities” between affluent districts and poor districts. From 1988 till 1990, Kozol visited schools in over thirty neighborhoods, including East St. Louis, the Bronx, Chicago, Harlem, Jersey City, and San Antonio. Kozol describes horrifying conditions in these schools. He spends a chapter on each area, and provides a description of the city and a historical basis for the impoverished state of its school. These schools, usually in high crime areas, lack the most basic needs. Kozol creates a scene of rooms without heat, few supplies or text, labs with no

Due to the forgoing facts brought to light by Kozol in his essay, it is apparent that there is a growing trend of racial segregation within America’s urban and inner-city schools. Educators and politicians seem to have abolished any semblance of respect for learning for its own sake and have made the school system a joyless experience for the majority of the children, which in turn seems to be related to the high drop-out rate in the inner-city schools. For America to remain great, just and competitive in today’s world, these educational anomalies must be timely addressed and corrected adequately.

Due to urban sprawl, the neighborhood of Walnut Park has been victim to marginalization. Similar to Pruitt Igeo, urban sprawl caused residents to leave walnut park and take businesses and jobs with them. Hammell (2016) states that, “Occupational deprivation arises when populations have limited choice in occupations because of their isolated location, their ability, or other circumstances”. The residents of Walnut Park cannot force business to stay in their neighborhood, so the lack of occupations is outside of their immediate control. The deprivation of healthy occupations causes a surplus in dark occupations, due to the fact people must find alternative ways to fill their time and provide for their families. Also, the link between marginalization and occupation impacts culture. Downes (1997) defines culture as, “the learned part of human lifestyles”. If a child grows up in a community where there is illegal activity, lack of opportunity and decreased importance on education, this is what they incorporate into their own life. The culture of Walnut Park is directly linked to its occupational deprivation and feelings of inferiority. However, Walbridge elementary school is working endlessly to shift this culture and bring opportunity back into their neighborhood.

Chapter six brings a different approach at introducing the importance of sociology. This chapter, focuses upon the historical significance of American sociology as society knows of it today. It discusses many different aspects of sociology, but it intentionally focuses on these important aspects that include: “The Chicago school”, sociologists whom attributed to American sociology, and the rise of female sociologists. These three fundamentals establish the overall history of American sociology.

However, Wacquant brings the term “inner city” to light, breaking down its meaning: “black and poor.” Living in Chicago gives one an exemplary example of the term “inner city” meaning “poor, black ghettos.” The references to “inner city” schools being synonymous with “poor quality” and “mostly African American” are damaging to urban terminology and creating a predetermined perspective of those who call the “inner city” home. The “hypersegregation” of the city of Chicago is a topic within itself, but the institution of segregation is, without question, existent here. In addition, “inner city” is becoming a label which implies unavoidable incarceration.

In many books, the environment may affect a character or may not affect a character. For example in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the environment did not affect Huck, even though the environment around him was completely different from the way he was. Another example is in The Great Gatsby; the environment did not affect Gatsby because he did what he wanted to do and did not let anyone make up his mind for him. On the other hand, in Ethan Frome, the environment affected Ethan because he was stuck in Starkfield. The environment does not affect a person or character most of the time, but in some cases, it may affect a character or person.

Additionally, my parent’s substantial economic and social capital was a great asset in my career path of finding a better education outside of my community. Professor Abrego explains that one’s social location shapes an individual’s identity and how one experiences how the world treats them (Abrego, Lecture 01/06/16). In my case, there were not as many resources that my social location offered, for this reason, my mother was determined to find another high school for me to attend, away from South Central. To emphasize, my local high school carried a bad reputation of teen pregnancy, gang violence, and lacked many resources, therefore, due to my mother’s strong social capital she managed to obtain a fake address in order for me to attend a better

When Mr. Clark originally taught at Eastside High School, the culture seemed very competitive and full of high standards. The students seemed very eager to learn and at a pretty high level for their age. Twenty years later, the culture flips dramatically. The school quickly goes from pristine to a graffiti-infested playground. The teachers are the prey and the students (mainly the ‘hoodlums’) pretty much do as they please. Education is a small goal for any of the students, and the students that do want to do well fear those “hoodlums.” Mr. Clark identifies this immediately when returning to Eastside High. During his first assembly, Mr. Clark let the entire school know that he was the HNIC. He gathered up all the trouble makers and sent them home, expelling them from school. Most were drug dealers, 5th year students, or drug abusers that were dulling the spark of the other students.

Growing up in a healthy and safe neighborhood with healthy inspiring people will influence a person’s way of thinking. This means a person would be capable of thinking positive and staying away from negativity. Oppositely, a person growing up in the hood or poverty with nothing but violence around them gets sucked into violence and hood activities. Some people that grow up in the hood try to act different from the hood because it becomes tiring to keep seeing people get shot down or joining gangs. It then becomes natural and people realize that this is the world around them and they will not be able to change it people will be people. The best thing for people to do is change themselves to stay away from negativity.