A Study of Streetcorner Men
By Elliot Liebow
ISBN: 978-0742-528963
166 pages
Publisher: http://www.rowmanlittlefield.com
Cover photo: AP/ Wide World Photos
Cover design by Jeffrey W. Talley
6/5 Stars
An anthropological study, written in a literary style. At its root this is a story, a story rooted in a moment, the year 1967 in Washington D.C.
(It is a worthy companion to ‘Street Corner Society’ by William Foote Whyte written 30 years earlier).
“Men without jobs
are Fathers without Children
because
they cannot be Husbands to Mothers
because they are sexual dogs.” *
In the caption above, Charles Lemert paraphrases the book.
- This is not true by the way- this is a thought model – a different thought model could contain different characteristics – rather it is a way to rationalize in the human brain and to make sense of the world around. Other models are equally valid.
On the streetcorner, Liebow writes, “failures are rationalized, into phantom successes and weaknesses magically transformed into strengths.”
It is this ongoing failure, the expectation of failure, and the self-fulfilling nature of these expectations, that divides families and results in violence, BUT a failure that is realistic and common and unavoidable, that destroys the most optimistic of natures.
The most beautiful thing about this story is that it “invites us across the extreme social distances into the lives of these men”. We realise they are no distance at all.
The book finishes with W.H Auden’s admonition
We must love one another or die
The Eclectic Book Review 