Ain't No Makin' It

Aspirations and Attainment in a Low-Income Neighborhood, Third Edition

Jay MacLeod

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9780813343587
• eBook ISBN: 9780429975080
• Topic: Sciences sociales
• Subtopic: Sociologie

This classic text addresses one of the most important issues in modern social theory and policy: how social inequality is reproduced from one generation to the next. With the original 1987 publication of Ain't No Makin' It, Jay MacLeod brought us to the Clarendon Heights housing project where we met the 'Brothers' and the 'Hallway Hangers'. Their story of poverty, race, and defeatism moved readers and challenged ethnic stereotypes. MacLeod's return eight years later, and the resulting 1995 revision, revealed little improvement in the lives of these men as they struggled in the labor market and crime-ridden underground economy. The third edition of this classic ethnography of social reproduction brings the story of inequality and social mobility into today's dialogue. Now fully updated with thirteen new interviews from the original Hallway Hangers and Brothers, as well as new theoretical analysis and comparison to the original conclusions, Ain't No Makin' It remains an admired and invaluable text.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• PART ONE THE HALLWAY HANGERS AND THE BROTHERS AS TEENAGERS
• PART TWO EIGHT YEARS LATER: LOW INCOME, LOW OUTCOME
• PART THREE AIN'T NO MAKIN' IT? THE MEN AT MIDLIFE
• Afterword: Freddie's Final Say
• Appendix 1: On the Making of Ain't No Makin' It
• Appendix 2: Biographical Sketches of the Hallway Hangers and the Brothers in 2006
• Bibliography
• About the Book
• About the Authors
• Index