Assignment 8 - Gang Leader For A Day (whole book)

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 1

This book reminds me of one I read in my English class called Freakonomics. It may have been mentioned in Freakonomics, I can't remember, but the writing style is very similar. This first chapter really got my attention because I live in an area of college station that is similar. On my street, there are a bunch of college kids and families living around me, but the next street over there are mostly black people living there (not projects but appear to be low income households). A lot of the time when I go to the convenient store on the street corner, I run into several black people in the store and it is interesting to see how they interact with their friends and the cashier/store owner. They talk to the cashier/store owner, who is Indian (and real cool with me and my friends), like he is one of their friends and sometimes try to trick him into thinking they paid for something they didn't. They joke around with him, too, but sometimes they get loud with him and sometimes it's really hard to tell whether or not the situation will escalate and become violent. Either the guy in the book was really naive (which appears to be the case), brave, or dumb because he was trying to conduct a study in what seemed to be a drug infested and gang-run neighborhood. I feel like back then, gangs weren't as violent/crazy as the ones now, so he may have lucked out there.

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 2

Chapter 2 of this book is really awesome because the author is slowly becoming more familiar with the gang, learning the hierarchy of gang members, and observing the different things the gang does other than sell drugs. It's as if Sudhir is being "initiated" into the gang by J.T. The main reason why I like this chapter is the fact that Sudhir has been somewhat accepted into the gang and it is now becoming part of his regular life. The coolest part was when J.T. confronts C-note about moving cars so that there could be room for the monthly basketball game. It would have been crazy/awkward to be exposed to that for the first time. I know I feel awkward when two friends fight even if it's over the phone, probably because I don't like conflict, so I can just imagine how the author felt. Watching C-note getting beat up would have been hard, too. One thing that I've noticed, though, is that the author uses the word "nigger" in the book a lot. I think the gang was using the word "nigga" and from what I have experience the two words have different meanings. "Nigger" has a negative connotation to it while "nigga" is used amongst friends, sort of like bro, homie, dude.

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 3

This chapter was really interesting because it showed that gangs are not just gangs. They are communities that work together with citizens in their neighborhood, even if they have conflicting views. Sometimes the help the gangs give to the community is illegal, but they help out the best they are able to. There is a lot more that goes on inside of a gang, and this chapter sheds light on the thoughts of gang members/leaders and the inner workings that drive the gang.

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 4

Chapter 4 was kind of annoying because Sudhir was supposed to be the gang's leader for a day, but he didn't really do all that much. It still seemed as if J.T. was the gang's leader and Sudhir would just nod and say yea to everything J.T. said. I guess you can't just give Sudhir the power of gang leader and let him do everything on his own, but Sudhir barely did anything with the position he was put in. The biggest decision he made was deciding who to punish between Otis and Billy, but even then he didn't have the gang leader mentality and tried to cancel out their "penalties". 

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 5

Chapter 5 got away from the gang functions and focused more on Ms. Bailey and the tenants of Robert Taylor. It showed mostly how the higher-up people in the community work to get what the families in the community need (Ms. Bailey exchanges liquor/beer for clothing, food, etc.). The chapter gives insight on how the Robert Taylor community survives without money and how each person helps each other. You could say that Ms. Bailey is someone who is looking out for everyone or you could say she using her "help" to control everyone (when she gives things to only certain people). 

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 6

Although Sudhir is a educated graduate student, this chapter made me question his intelligence. When he told Ms. Bailey and J.T. about the secret financial earnings of the tenants, he had to have known that J.T. and Ms. Bailey would hit up the tenants. In a way, there are times where trying to help someone results in drastically hurting others without even knowing, but this seemed to be an obvious situation where he should have known to keep that information to himself. 

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 7

I kind of feel bad for Sudhir because no matter what he does, he seems to get on everyone's bad side. The tenants were against him for giving away their secret earnings, he's against J.T. if he doesn't do everything with him, and the cops are pissed at him because he is keeping track of all their actions by doing this ethnography. When hustlers were being described in the book, it appeared as if they were describing Sudhir. He's a hustler just like everyone in the gang and Robert Taylor. 

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 8

This chapter showed just how much Sudhir had learned from the gang.

"How could I learn so much, absorb so many lessons and gain so many experiences at the side of a man who was so far removed from my academic world.”

This quote pretty much summed up Sudhir's experiences with the gang, tenants, police officers, etc. He learned that calling an ambulance in the gang environment is a lot different than calling it in a "normal" environment. In Robert Taylor, that ambulance would never come, but in any other place it would show up quickly. He also learned that gangs have their own organized government and work things out differently than a regular society.

Gang Leader For A Day - Whole Book

Overall, the book was interesting. It's crazy to me how naive/stupid the author was, going up to gang members and trying to get to know them. Now it is well known that you do not mess with a gang at all if you aren't with them because something is bound to happen to you. Sudhir got lucky that he was able to come out of such an experience with no harm done to him. And although I thought Sudhir was extremely dumb for attempting to do this ethnography, it turned out to be an interesting and enlightening experiment. It shed light on the economics of gangs and how things work around them. A gang in the area not only affects the gang and its members, it affects the nearby stores, people living in the area, etc. Today's gangs are much more violent and deadly than those in the past, in my opinion, and it would be awesome, if there was someone brave enough, to study them. It would be really cool to see how gangs have evolved, if they have at all, and see if they still perform "community service" similar to what J.T. did.