Week Ten: Commenting on a Blog

Today I'll be writing about Sonia Tran's blog post from Week 9. She addresses this article from the LA Times, about a middle class black family living in Orange County who recently moved because they had been the subject of hate crimes.

Your take on the situation is influenced by Stuart Hall's understanding of race as a "floating signifier." You also take a very negative stance on the future of race relations, arguing that "No matter what sorts of programs, policies and reforms a society undertakes, they could never allow for real equality." You're not wrong--"pure" equality is impossible. But it's impossible for everyone, from black to white, from gay to straight, from old to young, from fat to thin. As such, we can only do the best we can with what we've been given, and people will always hold grudges against people they don't know for reasons that have nothing to do with who they are. But we can do the best we can to minimize these incidents. We can enact more just policy, we can work to spread accepting and loving attitudes in schools, we can try and help those set in their ways to understand people they've been taught to hate. This course has focused a lot on our problems, our difficulties, and our differences, I think that the pessimistic view you take here is reflective of that. However, I think that there's always hope for change, so long as we understand that humans will never be perfect. The reason that Stuart Hall's research into race as a floating signifier is so important is because it explains how our current understanding of "race" came about, and gives us the tools to change it. Change the way we talk about it, change the way we think about it. And though we can never eradicate racism on the fringe, I think it's possible to get rid of prejudices like racism and homophobia in the cultural mainstream with dedicated efforts in the right areas. People from both sides have to realize that historical wrongs have been committed, whether or not some more grievous and overwhelming than others, and let them go. That's the hardest thing: no one wants to forget the past because they find the lessons in it important for the future, and that's true. But the past can mask and bury those lessons in hurt and loss, and often that's what sticks over lessons of equality. If we look toward the future and the future alone, who's to say that we can't overcome anything?

Week Nine: LA Time Article!

I read this article, which was published by the Times in April in this series looking back at the LA riots of 1992, twenty years later. It's important in light of the axes of difference that we've been studying in class, and also in the context of my own life as an educator of young people who, like myself, didn't live through the riots. This article brings up a lot of the problems with the public school system, but only indirectly and in the context of educating students about the riots. 

Teaching students about the 1992 riots is difficult because state standards don't mandate it and history curriculums are quite full without it--generally only reaching the civil rights movement in the 1960s or perhaps the Nixon administration in the 70s. However, students who have learned about the riots understand how they came about, see that some of those problems still exist in their city, and want to do something about it: "these teenagers also express hope that they can make a difference through personal action — education about stereotypes, for instance, or peaceful protests."

The fact that kids who learn about the riots have the motivation to do something with their new knowledge is valuable beyond the classroom. When racial, financial, and cultural boundaries divide people sharply enough, you get the 1992 riots. When students--the younger, more impressionable generations--are willing to change and to work for change in others, you have a real chance for a better future on your hands. In denying students the opportunity to learn about the riots because of the need to focus more on state testing, what other opportunities are they losing? 

The article's subtle focus on the negatives of standardized testing make me think of our discussions of neo-liberalism. While compulsory education is likely not something that neo-liberals are necessarily fans of, cutbacks to education and and a system of standardized testing used to determine where the cutbacks should "naturally" fall does. I can't help but wonder if the neo-liberal attitudes of the 80s and 90s are residually affecting our public schools and their funding today.

Some other cool stuff in memory of the '92 riots:

A story and photo series about LA during the riots and LA now.

An interactive feature on the LA Times website where readers shared their stories from the riots.

Food for thought. Cheers!


Amy

Week Eight: Commenting on a Blog

This week, I'm writing about Mitchell Beacom's Week Two blog post.  He chose to go to Compton, which I respect after seeing few people branch out that far from the Westwood bubble.

First off, this post was great in its exploration of Durkheim's understanding of differentiation in the context of an infamously low-income, high-crime neighborhood. Having been through Compton on the bus, I've been able to check out the visual exterior of the area but never the inside of one of the businesses. I'm impressed with the information he gathered by actually visiting a resident of the neighborhood and checkin gout his living room! (And let's be real--who wouldn't be impressed by a purple shag carpet and gold stripper pole... in the home?) I really enjoyed reading about his conversation with this middle-aged man who was Compton born and raised.

Now that we've read and learned a lot more (seeing as this post was from second week, Durkheim was really the only lens for analysis), I'd like to take another perspective on his post. After reading Elliot and Pais's study on race and class in Hurricane Katrina and learning a little bit more about race from Stuart Hall, I think the "racial" aspect of Compton that looms so unavoidably in discussions of the area is important to his experience. He discusses the man's living room decor as "a clear sign of cultural differentiation," and I find that assessment true. Other people, however, would make arguments about the man's race and social class as they impact his decor choices. Those could also be valid, but the fact that they have to be made irritates me. Some people, upon hearing his story, would laugh and say "only a BLACK guy would have a purple rug AND a gold stripper pole IN HIS HOUSE" (read: things my roommates say). To me, however, his choices are minimally impacted by his race. The culture he grew up in, which admittedly was probably at some point racially determined, has much more of an impact on that choice than his skin color. A Nigerian immigrant to America would be as unlikely to match those two things together as one from Taiwan or Peru or Ireland--so this man's choice was much more likely influenced by his culture and not by his race.

Thomas's video posts were helpful in his post because they underscored the cultural idea over the racial one. He demonstrated that Compton has a very unique and very strong culture that includes unsavory aspects like gang violence, and he showed us the way in which that culture is propagated. Overall, I found his post valuable for its insight into the life of a resident of the area he observed and I think his observations and conclusions apply to lessons learned in class beyond the limits of our early readings.

Cheers!

Amy


UPDATE 12/9: Woops! Didn't realize until today that I should have posted it on the original blog. Fixed!

Week Seven: Commenting on a Blog

Today I'm writing about Thomas Schulz's Week Five blog post on Los Feliz. He did a really great job describing the location--now I want to go, and I'd never even heard of it!

I found it interesting that he compared Los Feliz--and affluent neighborhood near Hollywood--to other, showier neighborhoods while also considering how it related to poorer areas. His thoughts on the exclusivity of places like Rodeo Drive were valuable because the correlation he draws between that exclusivity and the lack of sidewalk-walkers is very accurate. His analysis of the hair salon "juan juan" and it's nature as an "escape" related well to this point and provided a nice, flushed-out example. I also can't help but be partial to this post, as he was in pursuit of a friendly, walkable neighborhood and there's nothing I like better! (And nothing, it seems, that's rather down here in Los Angeles and Orange County.)

I'd like to add to his post, however, with the knowledge we now have about the environmental justice movement. He addresses Jane Jacobs' book and her theory that bustling sidewalks are equate to lower crime rates, and he argues that he theory seems correct--the busy sidewalks in Los Feliz feel safe, as opposed to the empty late-night streets in an area like Rodeo, where shader characters know there won't be as many eyes on them. I agree, and I'd like to apply his thoughts to poorer areas rather than wealthier ones.

What if people avoided the sidewalks because they avoided the outdoors in general? What if the air quality near your home was polluted by an oil refinery or incinerator? What if the city blocks that could be filled with small businesses and restaurants were instead occupied by a power plant and its fumes? The environmental justice issues at hand in these neighborhoods go beyond just environmental quality--they can also affect the residents' quality of life. If ambiance is one of the key factors in attracting business to a neighborhood, then these areas are at a serious economic disadvantage, too. And who knows what else their environmental problems could stop them from getting the opportunity to do or experience!

Things to think about, when you extrapolate a subject into another neighborhood,

Cheers!

Amy

UPDATE 12/9: Woops! Didn't realize until today that I should have posted it on the original blog. Fixed!

Week Six: Commenting on a Blog

Today I'm writing a response to Monika H.'s Week Four blog post. She and I are quite different, because I'm a regular on the bus because of my volunteer work/adventures and she was a relatively new bus rider. As such, I found her post quite interesting, because it gave me some perspective on what I consider "normal"--shouting match between the bus driver and a biker? Whatevuh!

She got me thinking, though, about what it means to commute on the bus and tolerate the shenanigans of those riding it. This week's reading is about all about "quiet" racism and continued segregation, and car ownership begins to feel like unintentional economic segregation--those who have enough for a car, gas, registration and maintenance segregate themselves from those who don't buy buying one and using as transportation space that no one else can share without their permission. People without the that financial option are forced to take public transit, which they have to share with whoever else chooses to use their right to ride it.

So while I understand her discomfort, I also think she could have done more to analyze her situation and those of the other bus riders. Why did they act like they do? Why do buses have the reputation for "horror stories," as she says? I think her post would benefit from a consideration of the reasons behind why her bus trip was the way it was--she's offered us a lot of valid information, but doesn't go quite deep enough into the motivations behind her observations. The observations themselves, though, are great!

I can't deny that I like creepy/cute/gross/awkward bus stories as much as the next guy, though, so here are some links for further... consideration:

Awkward Transit. Only the best in awkward transit moments, mined from around the country. A personal favorite... this guy:

And don't forget these guys, killin' it every day in ridiculous and very public stunts:

May your public transit be awkward and internet-uploadable!


Cheers,

Amy


UPDATE 12/9: Woops! Didn't realize until today that I should have posted it on the original blog. Fixed!

Broken schools.

Take a look at this video by the RSA (the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce) and Sir Ken Robinson to get an idea of how the "management" of the proletariat during the Industrial Revolution impacted the way schools were, and are, run. Robinson understands where our current education system came from, and also knows why it's a problem. More than that, though, he offers solutions--or at least ideas--to get us thinking about they way we educate our children.

Cheers!

Amy

Week Five: First time to Downtown LA!

Everyone knows where Downtown LA is, to a certain extent. But "Downtown" hardly fills the traditional roll of the downtown area of a major city. Sure, it has a nice skyline...

But so does Century City:

And Westwood:

So the traditional theory that "downtown" lines up with the skyscrapers doesn't hold true here, like it does with the Financial District in San Francisco. As far as downtowns go, LA's is hardly the focal point of the city. So much so, in fact, that I had never been there until this week, when I went to an LA Times event about their Information Desk. It turns out that their offices are smack in the middle of Downtown, so I dressed up and hopped on the bus to visit this part of the city for the first time. Here's how I got there:

The 720 again! Who would've thought I'd be on it twice in two weeks?

My 720 experience was much the same as last time, except that it was daylight, I had a purse, and I was dressed in business casual... so the same, excepting for the exponentially increases number of quizzical stares. Apparently, I'm not the sort of commuter a lot of these people were familiar with. I got off at Vermont and got on the Metro Red Line, so I couldn't see where I was going any more.

And here, I'd like to point out one of the misconceptions I had about Downtown. I'd been told all these horror stories about how "ghetto" it was, and read all these articles about the riots and schools and locked parking garages, so my expectations were very low. I was kind of expecting the Oakland of LA (because honestly, walking through Oakland makes me feel infinitely more vulnerable than walking through South Central or Compton).

What I saw when I got off the Metro, the surrounding view was nothing like I expected.

There were tall buildings. Clean sidewalks. Parks. A few small restaurants--too few for a place where people walk to work, but enough for people who drive. 

It was just city-like, in a way that shocked me. I felt like it was in an under-populated San Francisco. It felt normal, in a way that most of LA doesn't feel normal to me. It also felt genuinely urban, unlike the relatively un-diverse skyscraper areas on the Westside. I was really surprised, and really happy that I'd accidentally left about an hour too early--time to explore! 

I got to eat some good food, hang out in a park, and check out some of the area's great architecture. I was so happy about the whole experience--and then curious. Why would people from the Westside hate on Downtown so much? What about this could be distasteful to them?

Looking back at my post from last week, I realize that racism may be one of the reasons why people are hesitant about going Downtown--the racial diversity is undeniable. The historical mark left by the riots is, too. So while those are both excuses, they just didn't seem to explain the anti-Downtown bias I felt before I saw it. And then I realized why I liked Downtown so much: it felt like a "real" city, a city with a center, a city with diversity, a city with green space. It felt planned, and it felt a little unpredictable. And that's not what most people from LA know to be a city. They know Los Angeles--the big, sprawling, decentralized, semi-"postsuburban,"individualized "city" made up of a hundred other areas that could be cities and towns on their own. Having grown up right near San Francisco, I want a city that acts like a "metropolis"--but Angelenos expect their post-metropolis, and they like it. That's what people here want out of their city, and that's why they'll always argue with New Yorkers over whose city is better. 

Maybe I'm clinging to an old ideal here, but metropolis-type cities have always been dear to my heart. San Francisco? Boston? I'm there. Los Angeles? I still need a little selling on this city. But Downtown may have opened the gateway.

Cheers,

Amy

Week Four: Busing to USC

This week, I took transit to USC to visit an old friend. I know--taking the BUS to south central LA?! But don't worry, I'm a regular bus-taker (and also a relatively athletic six-foot-tall girl), so I've got some experience under my belt.

Here's the route I took:

The 720! *Gasp!* That's right--insert dramatic music wherever you'd like. The 720 Metro bus has a earned itself a real reputation, but I'm not exactly sure why. I've never heard of any crime on that bus line, so I think it's probably the collection of characters that the bus gathers as it moves from deep East LA into the Westside. Because you know Westside people... they're the ones who "don't do the ten." Anyway, here's the route map for the bus:

I hopped on at Westwood and got off on at Alvarado to take the 200 bus, but I'll be focusing on my experience on the 720. I was a bit over-cautious, as I was leaving around 8:00 pm, and I hid my iPhone and my wallet in my clothes the entire trip--I figured, why tempt fate? But that also meant that I didn't take any pictures, so here's one of the bus during the daylight:

Right near good ol' UCLA! (Or at least the Hammer Museum.)

Like I said before, I've taken the bus quite frequently both in high school and college, so I wasn't expecting to be surprised. And I wasn't, really. But I did observe a lot of interesting quirks about the bus route and its riders in the 40 minutes or so that I was on it. 

First things first: I was riding the bus from the Westside into the South Central/Downtown area at night, which meant that most of the people on it with me seemed to work nearer the ocean and live much further inland. That said, the ethnic makeup of those riding the bus left me as the outsider. And by that, I mean the only white female, with one other white male who got off somewhere around Rodeo. Other than that, the beginning of the bus ride had your usual groups represented: your small middle-aged Latina commuters, your black teenagers coming back from school/entertainment, the elderly people who probably can't drive safely, and an assortment of males that are harder to pin down.

The bus was crowded to begin with, but got more and more packed as we kept moving. It was strange to see the humble clothes and belongings of the people on the bus against the background of Rodeo Drive at night, and it was also strange to think of myself as one of them--who has the money for a car AND shopping on Rodeo these day? It really made me think about the socioeconomic differences that cause people to ride the bus.

Most of the journey was through pretty nice areas--Wilshire goes through some of the most iconic parts of town, like LACMA's lamps all lit up at night. Things got a little shabbier around Highland. The cars driving past tended to be older models, and there were fewer luxury cars. There were also more strip malls of the breed you see in Sawtelle, with smaller, seedier businesses. The characters who got on the bus, however, changed a lot as we moved further east. A lot more young men boarded, most of them with tattoos, tightly-woven braids, and sagging pants: quite befitting of a "gangster" stereotype from a rap music video. Along the lines of these guys:

I was curious: why wasn't anyone who looked like these guys boarding the bus west of San Vincente? What about the change in territory brought about this change in demographics? Nobody else who joined the 720 was unanticipated or all that different from the people who got on near Westwood. So why the change for this specific group of 20-something Latino and black males?

This week's reading, the LA Times article about the LA riots, really made me think about the culture of distrust that still exists between wealthy, sheltered, West LA and gritty East LA and South Central. After living in the Bay Area for 18 years, the so-called "quiet" or "underground" racism in the LA area seemed really blatant to me. People on the Westside don't want a subway connection to downtown for fear of "riff-raff" coming to their side of the city. People on the Westside would rather go to the valley to get a car part than drive east on the 10 for twenty minutes to the closer business.  People on the Westside may work downtown but wouldn't take their kids there. These ideas and many others float around in the West-Angeleno's consciousness, and they freak me out. They probably also freak out these guys who only boarded the bus after we got far enough east. The obvious cultural divide between these people is challenging to post-riot LA, but the geographical difference is more striking and probably more problematic. It's unjust to be relegated to a specific societal rank because of your culture, and even more unjust to feel safe in only one geographic area because of that culture--and that goes both ways, west and east. LA might be better off now than it was in 1992, but if that's true, I can hardly imagine what kind of difference existed if today's isn't enough to set people off. If anything, perhaps the fear that the East and Westside people have for each other is buried in the residual resentment of the riots. If that's true, Angelenos have a lot of issues to work out between each other, and that work has barely, if even, been started.



Cheers!

Amy

Week Three: Walking in Anaheim

So normally, when people hear "Anaheim," they're expecting one of three things:

This:

This:

Or maybe, for the sports fans, these guys:

If you imagined Dinseyland, then you know where I was this weekend! 

...sort of. 

My boyfriend lives in the Bay Area, but since he's a volleyball coach he occasionally swings down to "LA" (read: the Anaheim Sports Center) for a weekend. Because we're both poor, we usually meet up by bus near Downtown Disney, exploring the sea of IHOPs and shabby hotels in the area around Disneyland--which is definitely not intended for walkers. 

This also means that I have to undertake the epic journey via not-car to get 40+ miles away from my apartment. Last time, I did it like this:

Not cool. So this year, I decided to pay more for the convenience of the Prime Time Shuttle! (Which meant that first, I had to take the FlyAway to LAX, and I may have had to lie about my AirCanada flight number. The things we do for boyfriends, right?) Anywho, getting to Anaheim took me 50 minutes instead of 178. Worth it!

Now, for those of you who aren't familiar with the landscape around Disneyland, it looks like this: 

Note the lack of sidewalks, even in the residential neighborhoods.

Here there are sidewalks, but never any people walking on them!

(They're also very well-manicured--unlike high-traffic sidewalks and very

 like Disney. Also--check out the dramatic weather change!)

The strong division between residential and commercial areas here is striking. Walking the streets near Disneyland, it's easy to see that the area is not zoned for residential living. A sea of hotels and motels with cheap chain restaurants attached to them is the norm. So much so, in fact, that we couldn't find each other at first because there were two IHOPs on the same street less than four blocks away from each other, and each of us was convinced that the other person was not at IHOP... woops! 

It's obvious that the main focus of this area is Disneyland, but the convention center is prominent as well. Both structures are very much intended for travelers, and as such, the area is flooded with hotels. Like, this many hotels:

The blue arrow points to Disneyland. The number of surrounding hotels is outrageous!

We've been talking about differentiation in class, and to me, this area embodies the idea of geographical specialization. The biggest businesses in the area, Disneyland and the convention center, have influenced which businesses pop up around them and how they're run--even the balloon man in IHOP had a special set of Disney-themed balloon characters. Because so many people travel to these places, there are hotels with attached restaurants and trams that take them wherever they need to go--so no one ever has to walk on foot. And because there are no necessary businesses within walking distance of people's houses in the area, there are not sidewalks! (The closest Ralph's is almost 4 miles away, to give you some perspective.)

When I think about the fact that this entire area--which covers a huge amount of square footage (mileage, even!)--I can't help but wonder how healthy it is. The whole setup outside the two main attractions is kind of dilapidated, and it seems like it would lower the property values of the areas zoned for houses just behind these other streets. I'm also curious as to whether or not the weight of the Disney corporation helped zone the entire area for businesses that help feed the Disneyland monster, because that's really how it feels--everything in Disneyland's vicinity is dependent upon Disneyland for its profits, and if Disneyland were to go, so would all of these smaller businesses surrounding it. It reminds of previous lessons I've learned about Marxist critiques of the factory-centered factory town, in which the factory owners own the factory, the town, and the town's grocery stores, launderers, etc.--moving way beyond "owning the means of production" and instead owning... everything! 

Whether or not that's true, Disneyland has definitely had a strange impact on this area. Rental cars, people who are clearly not southern Californians, and semi-shoddy chain restaurants are the norm. My advice: if any of you are actually going here to go to Disneyland, take a car. 

'Til next time, IHOP!

Cheers,

Amy

Week Two: A Visit to Reseda

Today I went to John R. Wooden High School in Reseda to teach creative writing. It's a continuation school for at-risk youth from 16-18, and it maintains a seriously flexible schedule to accommodate parents, homeless and foster kids, and other students who would struggle to graduate at a "normal" four-year high school. Click here to read more about the impact that LA's continuation schools have on their students--and to understand what a tragedy it would be to lose them.

This was my first to Wooden, and actually my first trip to a continuation school ever. I've worked in LAUSD before, so I didn't think anything would be able to surprise me. When we pulled up to the school, the surrounding area looked pretty average:

Garages, lawns, recycling--looks like a suburb!

The school itself was only five or six permanently placed portable classrooms attached to the campus of an elementary school. (Sorry for the lack of pictures, but most schools have strict photography rules.) I did get a picture of their wonderful John Wooden mural from the internet, though--with Wooden himself in it!

When I walked into the classroom, it looked pretty average as well, save for the small class size. The kids and their teachers, however, clearly had great relationships, and talked to each other with respect and understanding, and that (unfortunately) stuck me as unusual. It's not that the teachers I've worked with before weren't good teachers--it's that these teachers were so obviously different. It turns out the the entire environment of the school was completely different than I expected, in a good way, and in one that makes for an interesting comparison between this continuation school, populated by the "worst" LAUSD has to offer, and other "normal" high schools in the system. 

As I began the lesson, the kids were about as attentive as any high school class, but it was when we started asking them individual questions about their work that their personalities really shone. They wrote poems today, and one girl raised her hand because she was struggling with symbolism.
"What are you trying to symbolize?" I asked. "What's the poem about?"
"My daughter," she said.
It was then that I really understood the demographic I was working with. I helped her out--she decided to use a princess as the symbol in her poem--but my mind was whirring the rest of the class. Especially when 6 out of 7 girls left early for "parenting" class. I also found out that most of the boys in the class were kicked out of their old high schools for fighting, or because they'd been caught selling or using drugs on multiple occasions.

I can't help but wonder: are these kids victims of the differentiation of American society? Most of them were bitter about their lives before they came to Wooden, arguing that their old teachers didn't care, and that the students at their old schools were intolerable in their wealth/attitudes/judgement. If kids from the same school district can't even get along because of societal stratification, how can any of us? The reading for this week, "The Emergence of Postsuburbia," grates on me now because of its focus on things like housing, commercial centers, individualized forms of transportation, and other elements of middle-class living that my students have never been able to take advantage of, and remain bitter about. I look at them and I hope, over the next ten weeks, to get to know them better. I also hope that these motivated but set-back students might spark a change--for their children, or their families, or even just for themselves--that gets them out of their current situation and helps them combat the societal norms that helped get them there. 

Cheers!

Amy

Neighborhoods.

I love living in a city long enough to understand how it's been divvied up into neighborhoods. (I may or may not enjoy the street cred, too... hmm.) Anyway, the LA Times has had an awesome "Mapping LA" project going since 2009, and with the help of readers' input, the map is really a great way to investigate LA on the neighborhood scale. Check it out:


http://projects.latimes.com/mapping-la/neighborhoods/

What's good in the hood?! (We'll find out!)

Amy

Week One: So what's "social difference," anyway?

What's up?!

(Is that a weird blog introduction...? Is it weird to not care?)

My name is Amy, and I'm a third-year English & Geography student at UCLA. I'm writing this blog for a class I'm taking this quarter, called "Cities and Social Difference." Quite appropriate in a city like LA, which is definitely divided along basically every line that you can think of that separates and classifies people. The fact that LA is such a bizarre "city" -- which sometimes seems more like disparate neighborhoods modge-podged together by a toddler -- really drew me to the class in the first place. I want to know how all of these places got lumped together and called one city, while still maintaining so strongly how different they are. How can people who "don't do the ten," who "can't handle Venice's hipsters," and who "avoid Hollywood like the plague" be so territorial and yet still claim the general title of Angeleno?

These are my questions. And those quotes are all real. (And while perhaps not a very nice reflection of LA's residents, you can't say you've never heard anyone drop a comment like that, haha.)

My specific interest, though, is education. I've worked as a teacher, TA, intern, tutor, mentor, and a you-name-it-I've-done-it; I've worked in LAUSD and SMUSD; I've taught in elementary, middle, and high schools. Needless to say, I've seen a lot of social difference in my experience in the classroom. Understanding that difference is key, because it can help you better manage your students. More importantly, however,  understanding the differences between students presents unique opportunities for leaning and cultural understanding that can only come out of a room full of people from different backgrounds.

Overall, my hope is that taking this class will give me a better perspective on the role that social difference plays in an urban classroom by giving me more information about the various ways that cities influence the culture of the people that live there. Hopefully you'll watch me move closer to that goal as the weeks move forward!

Cheers,
Amy