South Central Dreams book - Instructors slides

Finding Home
and Building
Community in
South LA
Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo &
Manuel Pastor

Making Sense, Making Home
• Focus on the demographic
change (Latino growth) in South
LA but with nuanced analysis
• Understanding tensions,
transformations, and change
over time in this area
• Stressing evolution of spatial as
well as racial identity
• Emphasizing ethnic
sedimentation vs. ethnic
succession
• Noting how organizing in South
L.A. will help forge the region’s
multi-ethnic future
Figure 1.3. Mural in Historic South Central
Photo Credit: Walter Thompson-Hernández, USC CSII project team

Research Questions
• How have Latino immigrants made
themselves at home in historically
African-American neighborhoods?
• How do they and their 2nd
generation children narrate their
racialized experiences and
identities?
• How do marginalized migrant men
make themselves at home in the
city?
• To what extent are Latino immigrant
and African-American neighbors
collaborating, sharing, and engaging
with one another? To what extent is
there conflict?
Figure 1.4. Bungalow in the Vermont Square Neighborhood

Methodology: Quantitative Data
Defining South Los Angeles and its neighborhoods
• Approximated the geographies by grouping 2010 census tracts that fall inside the boundaries
found on the LA Times Mapping project
Data sources
• US Census Bureau: 2012-2016 American Community Survey (ACS) Summary File
• US Census Bureau: 2010 Decennial Census
• Geolytics, Inc. historical Census data from 1970, 1980, 1990, and 2000
• Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS): 2012-2016 5-Year Pooled samples
• UC Berkeley Statewide Database
• California Department of Education
• US Department of Agriculture
• California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment

Methodology:
Qualitative Data
• Chapters 3 and 4: 100 in-depth
interviews with Latino residents in
Vermont Square/Vermont Slauson ,
Historic South Central, and Watts (40 1st
generation immigrants and 60 2nd
generation).
• Chapter 5: Observations and 45
interviews collected in South LA parks
and urban community gardens.
• Chapter 6: 19 interviews with South LA
civic leaders and 25 interviews with two
cohorts of residents.

Understanding Immigrant Integration through South
Central Dreams
• Immigrant home-making, not assimilation,
transnationalism, or exclusion.
• Home-making is an active process of creating
a sense of security, familiarity, autonomy, and
future-making activities attached to place.
• Latino immigrants in South LA develop a
place-based identity and not a monolithic
racial identity. Figure 1.5. Salo’s Mini Market Mural, Historic South Central
Photo Credit: Walter Thompson-Hernández, USC CSII project team.

Always Changing, Always
Contested
• The demographics in South LA have significantly shifted
towards a Latino majority…but South LA is still a significant
space for African Americans
• Critical events in the late 20th century led to an exodus of
African American residents from the region, and an increase
in Latino migration. Particularly from Mexico and Central
America

Demographic
Change over Time
• South LA, once a Black cultural
center in the early 20th
century, experienced a decline
in the Black population near
the end of the century
• Police violence, divestment,
and a decline in
manufacturing led to families
and residents migrating out to
safer middle-class exurbs.
Especially in the 1980s and
1990s
Figure 2.2. Public Housing, Watts

South LA Black
Population by
1970
• Tensions about long-lasting
economic and social
inequities boiled over in
1965 in the form of the
Watts Rebellion.
• The rebellion prompted a
wave of white flight that in
turn led to a geographic
spread of the Black
population. By the 1970s,
African Americans were
moving as far west as
Baldwin Hills and the area
we now call South LA was
roughly 80 percent African
American

South LA Black
Population by
2010
• Black populations became
more concentrated in
Leimert Park, Baldwin Hills,
and Ladera Heights. San
Bernardino County’s Black
population doubled
between 1990-2010, and
the Antelope Valley’s
population tripled.
• The heart of Black LA—
South LA—is now nearly
two-thirds Latino.

South LA Latino
Population by
1970
• Prior to 1965, most Latino
immigrants settling in LA
were concentrated in East LA
and the San Fernando Valley
• Many of these migrants were
men and agricultural workers
entering the US in
connection to the Bracero
program

South LA Latino
Population by
2010
• The end of the Bracero
program and the passing of
the 1965 Immigration Act
caused significant changes to
migration into LA
• Immigration after 1965
became more female and
more family-based, leading
to a demand for single-family
homes, a housing type that
dotted the landscape of
many South LA
neighborhoods

Figure 2.11. Decadal Population Growth by Race/Ethnicity, South L.A., 1980–
2016 Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Geolytics Inc
-67,526
-81,852
-55,242
182,835
100,233 97,925
1980-1990 1990-2000 2000-2016
Black Latino

Figure 2.12. Population by Nativity and Years in the United States, South L.A., 1990, 2000,
and 2012–16 Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Geolytics Inc
67% 64% 63%
20%
14%
7%
11%
14%
11%
2%
7%
10%
2%
8%
1990 2000 2012 to 2016
More than 30 Yrs
21-30 Yrs
11-20 Yrs
10 Years or Less
USBorn

Figure 2.15. Change in Black and Latino Youth Population in South L.A., 1980–2016 Source: U.S.
Census Bureau, Geolytics Inc
142,901
110,063
85,531
48,935
63,617
133,111
173,164 172,287
0
20,000
40,000
60,000
80,000
100,000
120,000
140,000
160,000
180,000
200,000
1980 1990 2000 2012-16
Black Youth Latino Youth

Putting Down
Roots
How have Latinos been sinking roots in
South LA?
• Having children
• Forming families
• Moving strongly toward higher rates
of homeownership
Figure 2.3. Population Growth by Nativity, South L.A., 1980–2016
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Geolytics Inc
129,692
31,454
13,612
-20,657
-8,063
41,085
1980-1990 1990-2000 2000-2016
Immigrant U.S. Born

South LA High School Demographics by 1981 and by 2016
2%
99%
91% 93%
57%
90%
98%
68%
91%
1%
5%
7%
42%
10%
2%
31%
7%
Crenshaw
Senior High
Susan Miller
DorseySenior
High
John C. Fremont
Senior High
Thomas
Jefferson Senior
High
David Starr
Jordan Senior
High
Alain Leroy
Locke College
Preparatory
Manual Arts
Senior High
George
Washington
Preparatory
High
White Black Latino AAPI Native American
67%
52%
9% 10%
17%
27%
17%
45%
29%
45%
89% 88%
81%
71%
80%
52%
Crenshaw
Senior High
Susan Miller
DorseySenior
High
John C. Fremont
Senior High
Thomas
Jefferson Senior
High
David Starr
Jordan Senior
High
Alain Leroy
Locke College
Preparatory
Academy
Manual Arts
Senior High
George
Washington
Preparatory
High
White Black Latino AAPI Mixed Race

Figure 2.17. Homeownership by Race/Ethnicity in South L.A. and L.A. County, 1980–2016
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Geolytics Inc
41% 41% 41%
36%
22%
25%
32% 32%
48% 48% 48%
46%
1980 1990 2000 2012 to 2016
Black Latino LACounty

Figure 2.18. Black and Latino Homeownership by Length of Time in Residence, South L.A.
and L.A. County, 2012–16 Source: ERI analysis of 2012–2016 pooled IPUMS data.
20%
38%
26%
34%
22%
33%
29%
33%
15%
20%
16%
17%
44%
8%
30%
16%
Black Latino Black Latino
South LA LACounty
30+ years
20-29 years
10-19 years
Less than 10 years

Settling versus
Succeeding
• While Latinos in South L.A.
may be long-settled, they are
not integrating by other
measures—particularly
measures associated with
economic progress
Figure 2.19. Black and Latino Median Household Income (2016 $), South L.A., 1990–
2016 Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Geolytics Inc
$33,291
$34,533
$30,067
$36,371
$37,553
$35,339
$64,185
$61,205
$58,098
$25,000
$30,000
$35,000
$40,000
$45,000
$50,000
$55,000
$60,000
$65,000
$70,000
1990 2000 2012 to2016
Black - South LA Latino -South LA L.A. County

Figure 2.21. Working Poverty by Race/Ethnicity, South L.A., 2012–16 Source: ERI analysis of 2012–
2016 pooled IPUMS data. Note: Working poverty is defined here as the share of full-time workers
between the ages of twenty-five and sixty-four living at or below 150 percent of the federal poverty
level. A full-time worker works at least fifty weeks in a year for at least thirty-five hours a week
12%
8%
32%
20%
South LA LACounty
Black Latino

Beyond the Numbers
• Latinos are disproportionately represented in the working
poor, suggesting both persistent issues with education and
pay but also leading to some degree of friction with a local
African American population far more likely to be
experiencing joblessness
• Immigrants with limited English abilities, rapidly changing
high school populations, and other factors— can make it
difficult to glimpse common ground between Black and
Brown in a new and constantly changing home

Echando Raíces,
Settling In
• 1st generation Latinos who arrived
in the 1980s and 1990s expressed
fear and anxiety about violence and
Black people. Especially towards
youth and gangs.
• They had very little interaction and
contact with Black neighbors while
simultaneously adopting dominant
racial hierarchies which are
accessible to immigrants.
• There were also experiences of
Black of parental mentorship,
bonding with older Black residents,
and moments of neighborliness.

Homemaking and Belonging in a Multiracial Community
Becoming Secure: Putting up fences,
gates, multiple locks. Shutting in and
Shutting out.
Knowing Place: elaborate spatial mobility
strategies for going and coming to work,
school, leisure, and strict rules (such as
avoiding certain parks or places).
Home as Haven: securing autonomy
through homeownership and place
making. Sense of freedom, pleasure,
control about what you can do within
boundaries of home (play loud ranchera
music, work in driveway, parties, animals
and fruit trees in the yard.
Ranchofication.)
Making a Future: through children and
parents. Childless folks had less contact
with Black neighbors.

Becoming
Secure
“No, no tenia amistades. . . .
No, I didn’t have friends,
because as I said, there were
only Black people living here.
And just one Mexican woman
over there. But no, I didn’t go
out. I was scared. Even in the
living room . . . when they
looked in I thought they might
come in through the window.”
pg. 83
“No, mi esposo las puso. . . .
No, my husband put them
on. And even so, when we
went to celebrate our silver
anniversary they [burglars]
got in through the front
door. Because out in front
there were some young men
smoking marijuana, and I
don’t know, when my son
left, they entered and they
robbed us of everything.
Everything. The money that
we had saved for my silver
wedding anniversary, the
rings, all of the gold, all of
the money. My husband had
brought a little money from
El Salvador. That was gone
too”. pg. 84

Black Embrace
and the First
Generation
“Mira. . . . Look, there were good
things and bad things. At the
time we bought our house we
were practically the only Latino
family on the block. And two
houses down lived a Mexican
man and an Americana, that’s it.
Everyone else was Black. But the
majority who lived here were
older people, and they were
very nice. We never had any
problem with a Black neighbor”
pg. 87
“Cuando el perdió . . . When
he lost his [construction] job,
we were at zero. What do we
do? Where do we go for
food? That was the very first
time I had ever spoken with
a moreno [a Black person],
directly like that, talking
about things—my English is
now more fluid. And we
started going there for food,
to a Black church. We went
to ask for food, and we were
in line waiting . . . and that
day they needed volunteers.
If you work inside as a
volunteer, they give you a
little more food . ..” pg.95

Making Place “Navidad es bien. . . . Christmas
is good, how shall I say, a good
fiesta in this place. I have not
gone elsewhere, so I cannot tell
you what they do in East Los
Angeles or things like that, but
from what I can see, in our
community, they are very
devoted, strong believers. So in
December, so these traditions
aren’t lost . . . some people
always organize the dances,
celebrations . . . Las Posadas.
These are traditions people are
trying to hold on to. And even
my children like these.” pg. 99
“My daughters’
quinceanieras went until 3,
3:30 or 4 in the morning.
And the neighbors don’t
meddle because we invite
them too. Here, when we’ve
had our fiestas, the police
have never come. They have
never bothered us.” Her
husband concurred: “Here
there’s more freedom. One
is freer, to do whatever. One
is free to do what one
wishes.” pg. 104

Being Brown,
Knowing Black
• 2nd generation Latinos grew up with
Black neighbors and resonated with
them.
• Some explained that their parents
worked a lot and were monolingual,
so they did not have a lot of
opportunities to interact with Black
folks like they did.
• Strong and emerging place-based
racial identity, and a pride of being
Brown in a Black space. It was also
dissociating from East LA Chicano
culture, which was associated with
anti-Black and nationalistic
identities.
Figure 4.3. “The older population, the older Latinos, the older African Americans, they don’t really get
along. . . . You might as well get along ’cause at the end of the day, we’re still living in the same
communities, we have the same struggles.”

2nd Generation Home-making
Experiences
• Establishing Security: bullying in the street and schools;
negotiating gang threats and police violence
• Accruing Familiarity: closeness to African Americans
(friends at school and in the neighborhood, teachers,
mentors, elderly neighbors)
• Securing Autonomy: gratitude towards Black mentors.
Those who bussed outside of South LA saw how others
stigmatized the region, further consolidating their
place-based identity and an embrace of Black culture
and influence.
• Future-Making: love and pride for South LA; community
uplift, giving back.
Figure 4.4. “I can still walk in my neighborhood, and I
hope my kids realize that there’s a lot to be done to
improving the condition of how we live, but I hope
they grow up knowing to do their part.”
Photo Credit: Walter Thompson-Hernández, USC CSII
project team.

Black-Brown
Tensions
“While I was growing up, majority of
the population was African
American. . . . We were the minority
so we got picked on a lot, especially
in elementary because there were
more Blacks and they felt they
owned the neighborhood. . . .
Middle school is when it started
changing. There started to be more
Latinos in the neighborhood, but we
still had the race riots. Like I
remember running out of the middle
school because it was Blacks against
Mexicans, and so people would try
to run home before they would start
fights” pg. 125
“Immediately when I got there,
there were the Brown and Black
riots in the schools. We used to
be on lockdown, and there was
more heat [police], so that
eventually kind of bled into the
African Americans gangs and the
Latino gangs that had never had
beefs before that, and now they
started beefing, right? And it was
like, Wow. Just when I think I’m
back home, now there’s this
pressure. The climate changed. It
became really hostile.” pg. 128

Navigating a
Black Space
“We were among the first Latino
families to move into the area. There
were other Latinos sprinkled around,
but most of the community was
African Americans, but they were
families, and they were—they were
individuals who were poor, but had
an incredible culture, were very
amicable with their neighbors. I
remember the lady who was behind
us, she kept a garden in her back
yard, and she would see me playing
in my backyard and sometimes she
would give me vegetables” pg. 131
“In the picture from my first grade,
I’m the only non–African American
in that picture, along with the
teacher. Everyone else was African
American. The funny thing is I never
felt that color difference when I was
in school. To me, I was just like my
friends. . . . Throughout school, you
could feel that African American
culture. As years, progressed, you
started to see more Latino students,
and some of that culture started to
dwindle a little bit. I didn’t see it
leave the school as much as my
sister. My sister went to the same
school and didn’t see that presence
of that [African American] culture
when she was there.” pg. 131-132

Figure 4.1. “I’m still proud of it, you know? I appreciate where I grew up from, you know? It
was a struggle, but like I learned from it. That’s all I got.” Photo Credit: Walter Thompson-
Hernández, USC CSII project team.

Busing to
High School
“I was just like some nerdy kid.
I was born here, and like I saw
the struggle, and like I want to
be better. . . . I did want to get
out of South L.A. because I
wanted to show that you know,
that I could do more. It was
almost like my identity was
defined in like not trying to be
from South L.A. anymore—that
was me growing up, you know,
trying to figure that out.” pg.
139
“[t]hat’s when I realized that
I was actually proud of being
from South L.A. Getting
through that psychology, I
realized how difficult it is for
a person like myself from
South L.A. to actually get
into a university and
succeed. . . . Instead of
stigmatizing the fact that I’m
from South L.A., I should be
proud of it because I beat
the odds and I have proven
the statistics wrong” pg. 139

Place-Based
Identity and
African
American
Affinity
“My cousins who grew up in
Lincoln Heights or in East L.A.,
they will make comments,
ignorant comments, that have to
do with race when they refer to
African Americans, and my sister
and I react very differently. To us,
it’s like you’re talking about our
extended family. They [African
Americans] were the ones that
were around there, that saw me
walk home, that were extending
a helping hand to my parents
when they needed it. So to me, I
see it differently.” pg. 148
“I feel like in South L.A. you
get more of the flava . . .
you’re more in tune with
your African American
community. Like East L.A.,
they’re probably more
Americanized, but they’re
still probably more Mexican
American and Latino or
Salvadoran. . . . Here you’re
more mixed in.” pg. 149

Figure 4.2. “I think for South L.A., the best thing you can do is what they did with me.
Open people’s eyes. Open their eyes and start seeing into the future and seeing how
their decisions affect everything that can happen.” Photo Credit: Walter Thompson-
Hernández, USC CSII project team.

Sharing Ground,
Carving Space
• Five emergent themes from studying
men in green spaces of South LA.
Green spaces were sites for:
• Therapy, solace, sanctuary in nature
• Responsible fatherhood
• Male sovereignty and sociability
• Belonging and home-making
• Emergent civic culture

Figure 5.10. The Stanford Avalon Community Garden plots flank a long dirt alley
and span eleven blocks, set below the Department of Water and Power utility
towers, just south of the flight path for jets arriving at LAX. Photo Credit: Pierrette
Hondagneu-Sotelo, USC CSII project team

Sanctuary and
Solace in Nature
• Some men described the
gardens and parks as places
to free your mind and be
free to reflect.
• A place for spiritual healing
and describing it as their
only green space for leisure.
Some even described these
spaces as church-like,
therapy, or similar to yoga.
Figure 5.2. Planting a Garden Photo Credit: Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, USC CSII project team.

Responsible
Family Men
• It is hard to live up to the
racially contested and
financially inaccessible
expectations of good
fatherhood for
disadvantaged and
marginalized people. Parks
made this more accessible.
• Gardens served as a place
that allowed Latino and
Black men in South LA to be
able to enact fatherhood
through their rural
backgrounds and ancestral
past.

Male Sovereignty and
Conviviality
• The study was not intended to be
predominantly about men, but found
women were rare in these spaces.
They were not really seen as safe
places, and when they were present,
they were usually tasked with
domestic duties like childcare.
• Places for men to gather with friends.
Shade structures or casitas serve as a
place to rest, talk, and connect.
Figure 5.3. Three Gardeners
Photo Credit: Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, USC CSII project team.

Belonging and Feeling “at Home”
• Love and pride in place. A
sense of ownership and
belonging in the city.
• The community gardens,
more so than the parks,
reproduce the routines of
familiarity and family that
commonly happen at home.
A lot of happiness rooted in
this space through “sweat
equity”.
Figure 5.8. One of the more rudimentary-built casitas. The white cabinet holds gardening tools.
Photo Credit: Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, USC CSII project team

Emergent Civic
Culture
• Urban community gardens
also became places for
conflicts and diverse views
over governance of the land
plots.
• At the same time, civic
culture here is nascent,
fragile, and contested.
Figure 5.9. At Stanford Avalon Community Garden, each garden plot is behind a locked chain-link gate and is identified by
a number. Photo Credit: Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, USC CSII project team

Toward an Ethos of
Togetherness?
• Latino immigrant men and African American men in South LA are
both shaped by masculine privilege and social marginality
• Masculine privilege allows them into these spaces, and social
marginality prompts them to seek solace, family man
respectability, male sociability/ sovereignty and home.
• They share similar struggles, and fulfill similar needs in the parks
and gardens of South LA
• Black and Brown hostility or togetherness? Neither. In green
spaces, they are mostly “staying in their own lane.”
• Breaks the public/private binary by recognizing that feeling “at
home” in public parks and community gardens.
• Immigrant integration as a process of inhabiting places and
activities that become familiar, routine, and secure

Organizing
Community,
Building Power
• Latino community is becoming more
rooted…but rootedness is not
engagement
• Latino and Black communities have
real differences…but share a number
of common place-based struggles

Organizing Black
and Brown in
South L.A.
• Focus here is on the intersections of that organizing
with Latinos and demographic change and what that
means for contemporary South L.A. leaders
• South L.A.’s cultural institutions, such as churches,
jazz clubs, and dance spots, are also places of public
interactions
• The region’s history is deeply tied to multiple
political and civic geographies, including statewide
and citywide struggles for higher wages and
immigrant rights, as well as to global events, such as
the wars in Central America

Being Black,
Building Coalitions
• There is a long history of
multicultural and multiracial
movement building in South LA, even
when groups were self-organized by
race or ethnicity
• Another vehicle for interethnic
organizing was through labor—a
nuanced tale given the historic and
ongoing undercurrent of anti-
Blackness in unions
• Also came in the realm of community
quality of life

Staying Local, Celebrating Place
• One of the reasons why Latino-led or -focused organizations did not take off was the relative
neglect of the area by citywide and countywide Latino groups.
• Latinos have seen their political salvation less in Latino-based groups and more in local
multiracial coalitions that can build power and take on some of the broad regional dynamics
affecting life in South L.A.

Leading in South L.A.
• Latino leaders generally recognize the need to
call out anti-Black racism—partly out of
principle and partly out of a political
calculation that this is helpful for establishing
bona fides in what has historically been Black
space
• Gap between the share of residents that are
Latino in South L.A. and the share of political
representatives, nonprofit executive directors,
and other leadership positions that are
occupied by Latinos
• Worry that calls for enhancing Latino civic
power can devolve into a rhetoric of ethnic
succession

Encouraging
Latino Civic
Engagement
• South LA Latino population is younger and so the share
of those who are of voting age is lower
• Latino population in the region has a sizable number of
noncitizen immigrant adults who are ineligible to
register and vote
• Latino rates of registration and actual voting are lower
than for other groups.

Figure 6.1. Civic Engagement of Latinos as Share of the Total Population in South L.A. and L.A. County
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, UC Berkeley Statewide Database.
Note: Voting age population refers to the population ages eighteen and older. Citizen voting age
population refers to the population ages 18 and older who are citizens
28%
35%
41%
59%
64%
23%
32%
35%
44%
48%
Voted, 2014 General Election
Registered to Vote, 2014 General Election
Citizen Voting Age Population, 2009 to 2013
Voting Age Population, 2009 to 2013
Total Population, 2009 to 2013
LACounty South LA

Encouraging
Latino Civic
Engagement
“There’s that older African
American guard who’s like,
“Okay, do we really trust you?
Do we really know you? Can
you really think
Black/Brown?” . . . I feel like a
sense that you have to prove
yourself all the time . . . every
single decision I make from
what time we open this
building to what time we close
the building to like what print
will we bring to the program.
Who I hire. Who I surround
myself with. Who I invite to my
house. I mean it’s all around
this idea that we have to make
sure that people see me as an
ally and as a bridge builder and
someone who is really
authentically, intentionally,
trying to represent a different
vision for what South L.A. can
become in the future” pg. 216
“[t]here’s always that thing,
too, that I see in the County
level—not to hate or
anything, it’s just, it is what
it is—that you see all the
upper management being
African American and then
the lower management is
Latinos. But African
Americans fought for those
positions for many years and
finally got there, but now the
whole community changed
around them. But now
it’s . . . do they want to let go
of that power? Now, that’s
political” pg. 216

Understanding
Black Loss
“I did hear a lot of “we can’t
even get jobs at fast-food
restaurants anymore, our kids
can’t get jobs at fast-food
restaurants anymore because
you have to speak Spanish.” . . .
And some people said, well,
we need to learn Spanish, but
that—you know, from a lot of
people that didn’t seem
practical and I think there was
some—there was a stress
about that. Like gosh, now
what do we do, we can’t even
get these jobs. And really I kept
hearing that, it was the
language. It wasn’t like, oh, you
know, they’re taking our jobs,
it was no, you know, to get that
job we need to speak Spanish
suddenly and we couldn’t do
it” pg. 224
“I mean we would say well,
these Latinos, you know,
maybe they’re poor, they
don’t have much but they
have numbers on their side.
Numbers is a kind of capital,
right, it’s a kind of wealth.
We don’t have numbers. We
don’t have money. We don’t
have political clout. So what
do we have? Now, to me,
you know, the only capital
we have or the consistent
capital is community and
when that goes what do you
have?” pg. 225

Building
Bridges,
Centering
Blackness
“My experience with the
Latino community has been
more that they just don’t think
we come. I mean, I don’t really
get the complaints about, “You
stopped my kid. You’re
harassing us.” We don’t get
those complaints. We get the
complaints that I called the
police and you never got here.
I called the police and you
didn’t do anything when you
got here . . . Whereas in the
Black community it’s “You’re
picking on my kids. We’re
afraid you’re going to shoot
us” pg. 233
“So this is kinda hard
because I think, for many
years, it was the old guard; it
was the older people who
were really the leaders in
our community. And it was
Council People—and people
really kind of depended
upon the system and tried to
navigate that system, but I
think as we’ve had more
police brutality and just
different issues, people
getting killed unjustly, now, I
think it’s more of the
millennials are kinda moving
in and it’s Black Lives Matter
groups, it’s people working
outside of the system.” pg.
234

Worrying
about
Displacement
“[y]ou know when it
[gentrification] was happening
around here by USC it’s like,
“Okay it’s part of downtown,”
but when it starts going and
encroaching deeper into areas
like West Adams . . . where you
have definitely strong, solid,
middle-class Black communities
that’s starting to generate a
really strong sense of fear.” pg.
237
“I’ve seen a number of homes
being purchased by young,
white couples, for whom
buying a house in South LA
has been like the easy route
’cause it’s been inexpensive;
it’s been they can’t maybe buy
one in a neighborhood they
would have bought one in
five, ten years ago, but they
can in South L.A., particularly
after the crash, ’cause a lot of
property became available, a
lot of people were made—you
know, thrown out of their
homes. . . . [In the past,] a
couple of my crew members
were white, and we’d get
stopped everywhere. We
would get like, “Why are you
here in the neighborhood?”
’cause people were just
curious at them seeing white
people. But now it’s not “a
thing” to see white folks.” pg.
239

Conclusion
• Multiracial organizing in South L.A. is not new but
the current era has brought a particular set of
challenges and opportunities.
• There may be a shared agenda for economic justice,
but it is clear that African Americans are more
plagued by issues of joblessness while Latinos,
specifically immigrants, are more affected by lower
wages.
• While there may be deep conversations about the
connection between deportation, over-incarceration,
and police brutality, the insecurities and damage
each induces are felt in very different ways.
• The future of South L.A. hinges on effectively
connecting Black legacy institutions and
contemporary African American residents with an
emerging Latino majority.

Summing Up,
Looking
Elsewhere
Figure 7.1. Rolland Curtis
Garden Opening Celebration
Photo Credit: Abode
Communities

Complicating Race
Relations
• Much of the literature either focuses too dramatically
on the conflicts between groups or paints too rosy a
picture of the natural commonalities between
communities of color
• South L.A. experiences suggest that bridge building is
forged in daily practice; it occurs over a long time and is
far more complex than simple snapshots of one struggle
or another can provide
• A shared understanding of racism and a political project
of creating “minority shared fate” can overcome job and
other competition

Rethinking Immigrant
Integration
• South LA has a much higher share of
undocumented residents than other
locales, even in LA County, and yet
deportation and detention did not
emerge as a primary concern
• Latinos raised in South LA see
themselves as quite distinct from East
LA Latinos, largely because of their deep
relationship with Black histories and
future

Making (and
Losing) Home
• In this context, Black–Brown civic organizing becomes
the rule rather than the exception for Latinos with civic
ambition, a sort of political habit deeply ingrained into
their thinking and their being
• But it is also the case that Black–Brown framing can
diminish the specificity of anti-Black racism and fail to
capture the hearts and minds of Black Angelenos
• Latino leaders perceive that the direct political paths
are mostly blocked, but they also realize that the best
way forward is to form alliances with Black leaders

The Future of
South LA
• Create on-ramps to civic participation,
including activities like beautifying parks and
staging community concerts
• Increase and deepen Latino leadership for
multi-racial coalitions
• Strengthen Black-Latino alliances, invest in
autonomous spaces
• Build capacity in existing South LA
organizations
• Invest in reframing the public narrative
around South LA, particularly in strategic
communications that stress the assets of
South LA, chart the transformation of
tensions over time, and point the way forward
to a future together

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