Gang Leader For A Day Summary

Gang Leader for a Day Book Report Gang Leader for a Day is a book written by Sudhir Vankatesh about the experiences of a college student who observes the life of a gang leader in the projects of Chicago. The main character befriends a gang leader, JT, when he goes to the projects in hope of finding some people to take a short essay about poverty. Following JT around, he learns how different life is for these people in comparison to his own. He is studies the sociology of the gang, its members, and the other members of the surrounding community. The events that are explained and reflected on by the narrator can be connected to the material in this course in the way that there is a clear difference in societal groups in the way that they function, …show more content…
This inequality is displayed throughout the book by the actions, and reactions of the gang and the community. The norms of society would tell the average individual to abide by the law, and not be deviant in any situation if avoidable. However, in the gang the norm is going against the law and thriving off deviance, not because they want to be rebellious, but because their last resort to money and power is by breaking the law. Beating, killing, threatening, selling illegal drugs, doing illegal drugs, and various other activities is mainly what this group does to survive and make a living. While I was reviewing the book I looked up some comments from other readers and came across a few that stated they lived in the area surrounding Robert Taylor and mentioned that they avoided this area because of the deviance and gang activity. They also mentioned that this book had a lot of good lessons to be learned from this particular area as well as others like it. This proves that societal groups outside of one another avoid each other mainly because they don 't understand one another. The rest of society avoids these groups because of the illegal activities they 're involved in, the violence, and the deviance. The message these kinds of group give off to other groups of society keep people at a distance because of the negative image they portray. “But he felt that his chances of success …show more content…
First of all, this type of study voluntary and is from the inside. The narrator is not part of the group, he poses as an insider to get most of his information. The conflict here is whether this study is right or wrong. There is nothing wrong with the narrator hanging out with the gang and hanging out with their families. The wrong part of this study is the fact that there is so much illegal activity that the narrator gets involved in. First off, its wrong that he observes the gang selling drugs and beating people to the point of near death, and second of all if for any reason they got in trouble or caught by the police doing anything illegal he could be in trouble as well. Besides the point of right and wrong, this study promises the honest facts of how people live in these conditions. Second, I think that it is different that he continues to show up to these places with a gang fully aware of how unsafe and dangerous it is. The narrator knows the wrong things that are going on here and does nothing but observe and write about it. On another note, he is getting the inside truth to contradict all the stereotypes given to these people. Since the narrator chose to study this, it was a voluntary study with the participants knowledge, and no harm done to anyone involved, it is not breaking the law. He could have been harmed, or gotten in trouble with the law for being an accomplice