Synopses & Reviews
In a world increasingly beset by ethnocultural conflicts, the pursuit of cultural rights has taken on new urgency. Claims for cultural justice affect economic distribution as much as they do address demands for recognition from marginalized groups. It is this vital connection between economic life and cultural expression that Andrew Ross, one of our preeminent social critics, explores in
Real Love. From the consequences of cyberspace for work and play to the uses and abuses of genetics in the O.J. trial, from world scarcity to world music, Ross interrogates the cultural forms through which economic forces take their daily toll upon our labor, communities, and environment.
In its relentless pursuit of cultural justice - an ideal comprised, in part, of doing justice to culture, pursuing justice through cultural means, and seeking justice for cultural claims - Real Love continues and expands the main concern of Ross's thought, namely the demonstration that, through rigorous research, the cultural critic can elucidate the complexity of everyday life. But even more than in his earlier work, Ross here examines the effects of debates about race, technology, ecology, and the arts on social and legal change. In particular, he focuses on how demands for certain forms of cultural justice often go hand in hand with injustices of other sorts and at other levels of social existence.
Through close attention to the concrete details of daily life, strong argumentation, and a marvelous sense of the anecdotal, Ross shows why cultural politics are a real and inescapable part of any advocacy for social change.
Review
"This definitive sourcebook (sic) compiled by Enck-Wanzer, who wrote his doctoral dissertation on the subject, is a tour de force. He provides a helpful and brief chronicle of the evolution of the Young Lords in his introduction and the foreword by Morales and Oliver is an inspiring personal retrospective... This reader brings together an impressive collection of primary source materials that let the Young Lords speak for themselves and transport the reader to another time and place."-National Institute for Latino Policy, Book Notes,
Review
"The collection of essays, speeches, pamphlets and photographs created by Young Lords members, primarily in New York and on the East Coast, includes the organization's 13-point platform and rules of discipline. The book covers the group's activism in education, health care, police injustice and gender equality."-,The North Texan Alumni Magazine
Review
“Offers a long-awaited introduction to the ideals and actions of this vibrant revolutionary organization. In so doing it opens a window on to the life of an entire community, and on a unique era of radical movement history. This carefully assembled collection promises to be the documentary sourcebook on the Young Lords Party for years to come.”
-Juan Flores,New York University
Synopsis
The Young Lords, who originated as a Chicago street gang fighting gentrification and unfair evictions in Puerto Rican neighborhoods, burgeoned into a national political movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, with headquarters in New York City and other centers in Philadelphia, Boston, Los Angeles, and elsewhere in the northeast and southern California. Part of the original Rainbow Coalition with the Black Panthers and Young Patriots, the politically radical Puerto Ricans who constituted the Young Lords instituted programs for political, social, and cultural change within the communities in which they operated.
The Young Lords offers readers the opportunity to learn about this vibrant organization through their own words and images, collecting an array of their essays, journalism, photographs, speeches, and pamphlets. Organized topically and thematically, this volume highlights the Young Lords' diverse and inventive activism around issues such as education, health care, gentrification, police injustice and gender equality, as well as self-determination for Puerto Rico.
In recovering these rare written and visual materials, Darrel Enck-Wanzer has given voice to the lost chorus of the Young Lords, while providing an indispensable resource for students, scholars, activists, and others interested in learning about this influential grassroots “street political” organization.
About the Author
Andrew Ross is Professor and Director of the Graduate Program in American Studies at New York University. His books include The Chicago Ganster Theory of Life, Strange Weather, and No Respect. He has also edited several collections, th elatest of which is No Sweat: Fashion, Free Trade, and the Rights of Garment Workers
Table of Contents
Jobs in Cyberspace -- Mr. Reggae DJ, meet the international monetary fund -- The gangsta and the diva -- The private parts of justice -- If the genes fit, how do you acquit? : OJ and science -- The great unamerican numbers game -- What the people want from art? -- The lonely hour of scarcity -- Claims for cultural justice.