Gang Members Were My Greatest Teachers

• In Event: A Critical Approach to Policing Dynamics

Abstract

This paper reflects a realization of lessons learned from four years of fieldwork for the book, Who You Claim, twenty years hence. The resilience, honesty, hospitality and humor of gang members helped me rethink criminology and white privilege, towards countering discourses of gangs as merely criminal, and appreciating how they are children with needs, creating something out of nothing, enlivening marginalized, criminalized spaces with excitement, meaning and hope.

Author

• Robert Garot, City University of New York