The Importance Of Violence In John Anderson's 'The Street'

Anderson starts the book by discussing four different neighborhoods on this one stretch, describing how the environment changes as you move further into the inner city. The neighborhood of focus discussed in the beginning of the book appears to have more of a “street element”, as Anderson calls it. People seem to have a general disregard for the law. Anderson makes a point to say that morning is typically the safest time of the day; I find it sad that there are neighborhoods so unsafe that you have to plan when you are going to be outside of your home. The further down the avenue that someone travels, the worst things get. It is this part of town where the code of the street is really evident. Reading further into this section makes it evident that these neighborhoods would be terrifying. Anderson sets the stage for the rest of the book with a definition of the code of the street: “…a set of informal rules governing interpersonal public behavior, particularly violence” (p. 33). The code of the street emerges when the influence of the police disappears and people begin to feel a sense of personal responsibility for their safety. When we think about the amount of violence these people experience or witness, it would make since that a sort of fight …show more content…
Because of this, the decent families are at risk, unless they adopt some of the street values while out in public. Although the decent families will do their best to ignore the street families when seen out in public, they also are not to be messed with. They will “get ignorant” themselves. It is sad that these people have to do this, because they do have such a hard time advancing out of the community. Trying to make more money and get out is seen as disrespecting the community. If a decent family is known to be trying to get out, they are sometimes retaliated against in a violent