Beyond the Eyes of the Dominant: Reciprocity and Peace-Building on the Street
Document Type
Oral Presentation
Campus where you would like to present
SURC 271
Start Date
21-5-2015
End Date
21-5-2015
Keywords
Low-income, Masculinity, Pacific Northwest
Abstract
Low-income African immigrant young men in metropolitan areas in the United States are subjected to police surveillance as well as stereotypical media representations, which emphasize violence, drug abuse, and criminality. In my fieldwork with youth in a major Pacific Northwest city, I studied the ways in which this dominant gaze is both internalized and redirected. This paper concentrates on one nighttime ethnographic incident, in which a potential gunfight between two groups of young men was narrowly averted through replacing one form of negative exchange with a positive exchange action. In this social drama, an escalation of insults led to the ominous brandishing of weapons. At a critical moment, one of the principal’s attention was reoriented through the gift of marijuana, reminding him of bonds of fictive kinship with his companions and pacifying the situation. When can such gift economies co-exist with, or overcome, hegemonic structures of power and violence?
Recommended Citation
Mohamed, Saeed, "Beyond the Eyes of the Dominant: Reciprocity and Peace-Building on the Street" (2015). Symposium Of University Research and Creative Expression (SOURCE). 53.
https://digitalcommons.cwu.edu/source/2015/oralpresentations/53
Department/Program
Individual Studies
Additional Mentoring Department
Anthropology & Museum Studies
Beyond the Eyes of the Dominant: Reciprocity and Peace-Building on the Street
SURC 271
Low-income African immigrant young men in metropolitan areas in the United States are subjected to police surveillance as well as stereotypical media representations, which emphasize violence, drug abuse, and criminality. In my fieldwork with youth in a major Pacific Northwest city, I studied the ways in which this dominant gaze is both internalized and redirected. This paper concentrates on one nighttime ethnographic incident, in which a potential gunfight between two groups of young men was narrowly averted through replacing one form of negative exchange with a positive exchange action. In this social drama, an escalation of insults led to the ominous brandishing of weapons. At a critical moment, one of the principal’s attention was reoriented through the gift of marijuana, reminding him of bonds of fictive kinship with his companions and pacifying the situation. When can such gift economies co-exist with, or overcome, hegemonic structures of power and violence?
Faculty Mentor(s)
Mark Auslander