“Flood” by Daniel Alarcón focuses on a town that is “flooded” with gang conflicts an the gangs determine the townspeople’s fate. The child narrator and the rest of the children in “Flood” are paradoxical to the usual portrayal of children. In “Flood” the children clearly have the “young gangster” in them. Whether the characters recognize themselves as gang members or innocent civilians, the gangs and their ongoing conflict and disagreements rule part of the characters everyday lives. So, the setting of “Flood” has a large influence and authority over the character’s lives.
The drama takes place in Peru, in an underprivileged town. We quickly learn that from a young age the children are aware that avoiding gang involvement, or the “University” is almost impossible and that is why they “[call] it the University because it’s where you [go] when you [finish] high school” (Alarcón 93). The characters know being involved in some type of gang related activity is their fate. However, we are shocked when we find out that the term “University” is used to symbolize jail, since it is the complete opposite of the generally accepted definition of the term. Clearly, the gangs restrain the children’s futures and the gangs control the children’s fate.
Further, in “More than 86% of Peruvians Feel Unsafe” by Marguerite Cawley, he highlights different features of how Peru struggles with the conflicts of street gangs, and the side effects these conflicts have upon the people. Cawley points out that the people of Peru live in apprehension, and gangs maintain control using fear. An example of the gang controlling the future of the civilians is prominent through Lucas, Renan’s older brother, who is in jail for assault. Even though Luca ...
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...is is common in the Latino culture. Overall, we are flooded with the conflicts the characters live through and how the gang’s conflicts affect their fate.
Works Cited
Alarcon, Daniel “Flood” Portable Legacies. Schmidt, Jan Zlotnik., and Lynne Crockett. Portable Legacies: Fiction, Poetry, Drama, Nonfiction. Boston: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2009. Print.
Cawley, Marguerite. "More than 86% of Peruvians Feel Unsafe: Govt Survey - InSight Crime Organized Crime in the Americas." More than 86% of Peruvians Feel Unsafe: Govt Survey - InSight Crime | Organized Crime in the Americas. N.p., 22 Feb. 2013. Web. 25 Jan. 2014.
Pastor, James F. "Gangs in America – A Deadly Game." Gangs in America – A Deadly Game. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Feb. 2014.
"Poverty, Broken Homes, Violence: The Making of a Gang Member." The Trauma Mental Health Report. N.p., 4 Nov. 2011. Web. 18 Feb. 2014.
This book was about a street gang called the Mighty Vice Lords. They were the second largest gang in Chicago with about 30,000 members. The Vice Lords started in the Illinois Training center (Juvenile Correctional Facility) for boys in St. Charles Illinois during 1958 and was led by Edward “Pepalo” Perry and Alfonso Alfred. This group was known to be brutal and violent. It discussed how a violent gang can become a community organization and change the way things were done for the betterment of the community. This information is important because it showed that gangs can become a positive force.
This book also has the perspective of the police, which show the gang violence as a more black and white or good versus evil issue, and their militant approach to gang reformation. Jorja Leap holds a view that to stop gang violence, the same members that were once gangbanging need to divert the youth away from the same lifestyle.
The newscasters provide statistical evidence of new overflowing homicides and violent actions. The gang seems to be in retaliation for the method of eradication that the government claims to have. The way that the officials decided to handle it only caused the gang members to retaliate and created a hostile environment within the community. Since there were illegal immigrants involved it also diminished the reputation of hard-working people who continue to live in fear of prosecution in accordance with
In Mike Sager’s Death in Venice, Sager creates a vivid story about the gang in Venice as well as their addiction to cocaine. What I enjoyed about this article, was that it told a story in the perception of the gang members. It allowed me to see a glance through the lives of the gangs in the late twentieth century. Throughout the story, I felt multiple emotions, it ranged from disbelief to anger. It is astounding how Sager documented the lives of young males in Venice. As a Chicana, I was surprised by the actions in the article, I grew up in an environment where my daily life was not surrounded by gangs and drive-bys.
In his observation of the boys, he finds that these boys are criminalized by many social forces besides the police. “I found that schools pushed out boys who had been victimized.” (pg. 6). Many boys feel that their school system blames them for crimes that have occurred in their area, or as a danger to other students in the classroom. These boys think that these experiences of victimization are part of their street life. Rios says that if the institutions of social control believe that all young people follow the code of the street, then programs and interactions with margined youth’s will be based on this false information. This dishonest perception of youth is what leads to their
Some kids have no other choice but to join the gangs at an early age. Lack of parent supervision has been shown to be linked with both boys and girls joining a gang. Even though most have men to prove they are the violent ones, not every gang member is shown to be violent. While the rest of Luis’s gang members treat women with disrespect, Luis seems to respect everyone no matter what gender they are. Being told his own mom the pain she had to go through influenced his ways of viewing and treating
This book review covers Policing Gangs in America by Charles Katz and Vincent Webb. Charles Katz has a Ph.D. in Criminal Justice, while Vincent Webb has a Ph.D. in Sociology, making both qualified to conduct and discuss research on gangs. Research for Policing Gangs in America was gathered in four cities across the American Southwest; Inglewood, California, Albuquerque, New Mexico, Las Vegas, Nevada, and Phoenix, Arizona. This review will summarize and discuss the main points of each chapter, then cover the relationship between the literature and class discussions in Introduction to Policing and finally it will note the strengths and weaknesses of book.
Schmidt, L. M., & O'Reilly, J. T. (2007). Gangs and Law Enforcement: A Guide for Dealing with Gang-Related Violence. Springfield: Charles C Thomas Publisher, LTD.
Boyz N the Hood was a film created to convey an anti-gang message as well as to provide societal members an in-depth look at life in “the hood” so he or she can expand their culturally awareness of identifying societal issues (Stevenson, 1991). Upon the debut of “Boyz N the Hood” violence erupted at theaters across the nation, resulting in multiple shows pulling the film from scheduled showings to alleviate future violent behaviors (Stevenson, 1991). The film profoundly illustrates the realty of the events revealed within the storyline that frequently occur on a daily basis within every impoverish community; however, is overlooked by the individuals who are not directly involved and or affected (Leon-Guerrero, 2016) Children of lower socioeconomic status often are raised in ghetto neighborhoods where they often witness, crime, violence, gang activity, abuse, and drugs (Leon-Guerrero, 2016). Ghetto communities envelop tumultuous cycles of violence and substance abuse creating a pervasive occurrence within the residents of the community. This is prevalent in lower developed communities that unfortunately many children and the youth populace indirectly inherit and sadly conform to, as there are no other means to an end for them (Leon-Guerrero,
As can be seen, the author teaches the readers that gang violence and the pressure to fit in will lead nowhere but trouble within yourself and others.In the article Gang Violence by Gale student resources and content they state that gang violence in the United States has gone up since the mid 1980s and 1990s.“I had certain yearnings at the time, which a lot of us had, to acquire authority in our own lives in the face of police, joblessness and powerlessness.Las Lomas was our path to that, but i was frustrated because i felt the violence was eating us alive.” pg 113. The author shows us how by acquiring authority he loses his self morals, and in that moment in his life he feels powerless and feeling as if he had no choice but to follow in the violent paths.It is important we read fiction because the
Gang involvement has been quite higher than past years. The 2008 National Youth Gang Survey estimates that about 32.4 percent of all cities, suburban areas, towns, and rural counties had a gang problem (Egley et al., 2010). This represented a 15 percent increase from the year 2002. The total number of gangs has also increased by 28 percent and total gang members have increased by 6 percent (Egley et al., 2010). This shows how relevant gang related activity is in today’s society. More locations are beginning to experience gang activity for the first time. Gang crime has also been on the rise in the past...
3. Maclure, Richard, and Melvin Sotelo. 2004. "Youth Gangs in Nicaragua: Gang Membership as Structured Individualization." Journal of Youth Studies 7:417-432.
Los Angeles, the “gang capital” of the nation. Over 450 gangs in the city, some have been in existence since the 1950’s. All of these gangs combined have an individual total of about 45,000. Gang affiliation has taken a big role in the city of Los Angeles, in the last 3 years there has been a total of about 16,000 crimes, 491 of them were homicides. Gang affiliation has taken a big role in the lives of many young people, falling into drugs, and maybe in the course of committing murder or other crimes. Gang affiliation is an important role in the book Always Running and its main protagonist Luis Rodriguez. Also it may provide information on why we need fiction in our classrooms.
*Many of the juvenile gangs that have formed in the United States in recent years are reminiscent of the post -war pachucos (Paz, 14).
Hallswort, S. And Young, T. (2004) Getting Real About Gang. Criminal Justice Matters [online]. 55. (1), pp 12-13 [Accessed 10 December 2013]