Street Subculture Research Articles

Видовое разнообразие делинквентных молодежных субкультур в современной России: опыт теоретического исследования

Social disorganization triggers the development of subcultures, both positive and negative. As part of innovative adaptation, a person or a group may update certain sets of values, thus offering an alternative solution to some existing contradictions. Destructive socio-cultural associations, on the contrary, revise and oppose the generally recognized and accepted values, which leads to protest activity and what Peter Berger defined as anti-societies. The article describes the current diversity of delinquent youth subcultures in Russia and their development. The author designed a typology based on sociological interpretation, affiliations, and risks: 1) subcultures with career prospects; 2) subcultures of antisocial leisure activities; 3) subcultures that imitate certain totalitarian organizations; 4) subcultures of escapism; 5) subcultures of gender orientation; 6) street subcultures; 7) school-shooting subcultures. This classification takes into account those aspects of social life that deserve special scientific attention. Each subcultural community requires a special interdisciplinary approach that would consider its socio-cultural and legal adaptation mechanisms, causes, and online and offline functioning.

Street Subculture: Children's Livelihood Strategies for Surviving on the Streets of Addis Ababa

Street Subculture: Children's Livelihood Strategies for Surviving on the Streets of Addis Ababa

Exiting Commercial Sex Work: a Case of Adolescent Street Girls of the Harare Central Business District in Zimbabwe

AbstractThe paper interrogates narratives of adolescent street girls of the Harare Central Business District, Zimbabwe, exiting commercial sex work. A qualitative research methodology punctuated by street ethnography was adopted to gather data for the paper. A feminist social work approach and empowerment theory were used to have a deeper understanding of the lives of these children. Research findings suggest that there were very few cases where adolescent street girls of Harare Central Business District were successfully exiting transactional sex. There were varied and multiple reasons why they could not successfully exit commercial sex work. Some of them included addiction on commercial sex work, limited survival options outside commercial sex work, peer pressure, street subculture, and substance abuse. The paper concludes by advocating and lobbying key stakeholders such as the Government of Zimbabwe to improve the lives of children in street situations through provision of social protection mechanisms.

Resilient Dwellers of Urban “Slums”

Abstract This study was designed to examine the survival activities of the street children in Ibadan, Nigeria, the street sub-cultures among them, the push factors, and language use in terms of their inventions of communication strategies for survival as “slum” dwellers. A total of 34 in-depth interviews and seven key informant interviews were conducted among purposively selected street children and stakeholders, respectively, in Iwo-Road, Ibadan. The findings show that the street children predominantly engaged in begging and petty hawking among other activities. Three subcultures—children of the streets, children on the streets and street family children—existed among the children. Poverty, dysfunctional families, the death of parents, and the search for excitement pushed the children to the streets. Street children have developed different communication strategies such as non-verbal acts, verbal narratives, emotional appeal, dramatisation, music, prayers, and abusive expressions to fit into their peculiar groups and survive as street dwellers.

An intersectional analysis of socio-cultural identities and gender and health inequities among children and youth in street situations in western Kenya

Research has uncovered substantial gender, social, and health disparities among children and youth in street situations (CYSS) in Eldoret, Kenya. From 2013-2014 we engaged CYSS aged 11-24 years in a qualitative study to explore the sexual language and practices used in the street subculture in Eldoret, Kenya. We engaged 65 CYSS in 25 in-depth interviews and 5 focus group discussions. This work uncovered stark gender inequities, which result in girls and young women in street situations experiencing profound levels of sexual and gender-based violence and harmful sexual and reproductive health outcomes. To comprehend the underlying drivers of these inequities and to appropriately and adequately intervene, we sought to comprehend how CYSS’s social identities intersect with systems of oppression and privilege to produce and maintain these inequities. We therefore sought to reanalyze the original data from this study using intersectionality as a theoretical framework to explore how systems of oppression in Kenya have shaped the street subculture, construct CYSS’s street and resistance social identities, and how these social identities and the street subculture intersect with macro-level structural factors to produce health and gender inequities. Our analysis identified three distinct social identities that are given to CYSS in Eldoret: Chokoraa (garbage pickers), Mshefa (hustlers), and Mboga ya jeshi (vegetables for soldiers). Our findings revealed how these identities and the street subculture intersect with the Patriarchy, the political-economic context, and social cultural forces in Kenya, resulting in hegemonic masculinity and detrimental gender roles and norms for young men and women. Our findings show that CYSS are a product of the oppressive systems that construct their circumstances and shape their social identities. This population urgently requires policies and programs that intervene at multiple levels to halt the harmful practices within street subculture and associated with street-involvement.

Phenomenon of Youth Street-Criminal Subculture in Russian Society

This article is devoted to AUE, a street subculture on social media and in cities. The term AUE in Russian translates as prisoners' ways are united, or prisoners' criminal union. It is a subculture that promotes a criminal way of life, cultivates an image of a hooligan, and is based on hatred towards law enforcement. However, there is a certain stylization in all of that, especially when AUE manifests on Russian social media. Members are aged between 12-13 years and 25-30 years; there are older members as well. The goal of this study is to perform a comprehensive analysis of collective stereotypes about crime and prison that exist among the street youth. The phenomenon of AUE is viewed as a hierarchy of finance and power that solves the social problems that the youth faces. Financial and legal help may be provided to prisoners from the street. It also creates youth financial institutions such as a shared cash fund and a system for financial and physical support. The article lists popular paradigms about crime and prison, and social practices of the street youth. This article also discusses the social and psychological features of AUE members by creating a generalized portrait of an AUE member. We also determine the degree of hostility of this movement to the state and society. Finally, we identify youth groups that may be targeted by the destructive AUE ideology.

The Fetal Patient, Beyond Prenatal Diagnosis

Introduction Women living on the streets are vulnerable to various social, psychological, economic, and health related problems. Girls who work and live on the streets are exposed to the street subculture

Experiences and Determinants of Contraceptive Use among On-Street Women in Shashemene Town, West Arsi Zone, Ethiopia

Introduction Women living on the streets are vulnerable to various social, psychological, economic, and health related problems. Girls who work and live on the streets are exposed to the street subculture

“It’s Only a Game of Chance”: A Portrait of Gambling Among Street Children in Mumbai

For street children in Mumbai, gambling is mostly a social and recreational activity. This study is based on data gathered from a survey of 70 youths aged 12 to 24, two focus groups, and participant observation. It offers glimpses into various facets of their gambling, including age patterns, games played, venues, and how group and street subculture strongly influence participation. Street children perceive gambling as a “game of chance,” implying it is a form of recreation, not to be taken seriously. Given the pervasiveness of gambling and the absence of other recreational and money-saving opportunities, there is a need to design educational and preventive interventions for street children.

FEATURES OF HOMELES DEVIANT CAREER

In the last decade the research interest in problems and opportunities of social support of the homeless became topical. It relates to two key points. On the one hand, despite the development of assistance and support system for the homeless in Russia, expanding the range of social services for rehabilitation of this population group, the number of homeless people remains consistently high and causes a number of obvious and latent risks for the society in general. On the other hand, we are dealing with a new ideology of the welfare state that aimed at the recognition of the rights, interests, requirements of all social groups, regardless of their social status. Purpose. Analysis of the main stages of homeless deviant career, revealing mechanisms leading to homeless people social exclusion. Methods of the research are narrative interviews with homeless people held during 2014 in «Mercy bus» belonged to the Orthodox mercy service in the large industrial city of Russia. The choice of high-quality research strategy is determined by the purpose of the research and specific features of the object. The closeness of this social group does not involve large-scale sociological researches. At the same time, investigation of individual life trajectory for revealing the main stages of deviant career determines the selection of narrative interviews as a method of the research. Further to the research we used the method of incomplete sentences, which allows to fix the respondents’ ideas about their own situation, the emotional relation to themselves, to the society, past and future of the respondents. Results. In the research stages of deviant career were denoted. The start point of deviant career is violations in the process of primary socialization of a child, the origins of which are in the family. The family becomes an initiator of social exclusion, limiting child’s access to the social resources and reducing child’s opportunities of implementing his self-empowerment. An important stage of deviant career is person’s acquaintance with street subculture. The subculture of homeless people offers the person concrete mechanisms of survival in a deep crisis situation. This process is accompanied by the interiorization of new values and valuable orientations, updating of other needs. The further movement on the deviant career ladder is connected with the fact that a person starts testing subculture practices. Subculture of the homeless, according to our research, is characterized by uniformity and the scarcity of daily events with the absence of motivation on any changes in the structure or content of his life. Conclusion: deviant career of homeless people relates to their limited social resources and a number of social barriers that prevent them from social inclusion and returning to more favorable living conditions. Increasing the availability of public services and recruiting the help and support of non-profit organizations can significantly enhance the resources of homeless people and reduce their rates of deviant career. Knowledge of development mechanisms of deviant career increases the possibility of timely implementation of preventive and rehabilitation of social work with the homeless.

Comparative Evaluation of Crime Incidence using Enhanced Density based Spatial (Dbscan) Clustering

is the cream of crimes, crime fatalities, theories of ill-legal and abnormal behavior, social exploration, anti- crime polices, the political terrain of social control. So criminology involves the factual deeds in the streets, police stations, and courts, behind prison bars, board rooms and battlefields. Its practitioners are likely to slot in the orderly appraisal of the effectiveness of criminal justice policies and proposals, as well as the discovery of the source-cultural, economic and global roots of crime, rates of crime and meaning of crime, or the diverse ways of measuring criminal activity and its impact. Criminologists typically accumulate and scrutinize data sets that may be quantified, for example statistical studies on the rise and fall of crime rates, and/or qualitative, for example ethnographic studies on street subcultures and drug use. The research work concentrates in bringing of qualitative and quantitative study of crime rates and their behaviors. Here in this research work Density based spatial clustering is compared and analyzed with an enhanced DBSCAN algorithm, the results are also grouped in order to provide the efficiencies of crime rates. The outlook research work can be resolved by enhancing hybrid models in order to have condensed outlier detection.

Street children in Mafikeng, North-West Province: a qualitative study of social experiences

AbstractThe general perception, on the part of South African society, is that street children are a major social menace. Yet the reality is that, street children are a vulnerable group that suffer both psychological and physical- violence including sexual abuse. This qualitative study investigated the social experiences of street children in Mafikeng, North-West Province in South Africa. Data were collected using focus group discussions made up of a total of 20 participants aged 10-19 years, and selected using convenience sampling. Three themes were extracted using the consensual qualitative method and constant comparison to establish credibility and trustworthiness. The results of the study revealed three major themes (i.e. reasons for abandoning home: life in the streets, and the desire to go back home), and three sub-themes (risks and challenges encountered, regrets, and the desire for rehabilitation and schooling). Recommendations included the need for psychological interventions among this group, the need further for research, and the need to use probability sampling techniques in future studies, as this might provide a more comprehensive picture of the situation.Keywords:Street children, social experiences, Mafikeng, Africa, vulnerable, psychological interventionIntroductionThe rapid increase in the number of homeless or street children in the cities of Africa and in the North West Province of South Africa in particular, is a matter of grave concern. Many street children are feared by members of the public because of their general physical presentation in public. They are usually dressed in rags, are unkempt, live from hand to mouth, and roam the street all day long. These children are more visible around market places, vehicle parking areas, busy road junctions, outside cinema houses, and other busy public places. At night, they sleep in uncompleted buildings, at bus stops, under bridges, in abandoned vehicles, in public gardens and parks or simply in the open. They also experience economic challenges and psychological trauma, emanating from physical violence, which includes police brutality and sexual abuse perpetrated by members of society.Street life may result in the children becoming vulnerable to exploitation, which in turn may make them get hooked to drugs such as marijuana, and glue. Street children often engage in more than one type of economic activity to make ends meet. Sometimes they engage in seasonal work in which the earnings are very low. Often the activities which they engage in are unlawful or morally inappropriate. According to Adisa (1994), street children engage principally in petty crimes such as shoplifting and pick-pocketing; they seldom take part in serious crime like robbery, car hijacking or murder. Glue-sniffing and other forms of drug abuse and prostitution also tend to be part of the street subculture (Jansen, Richter, & Griesel, 1992). The involvement in a myriad criminal activities leads to the propensity of street youths to graduate from, what Diop and Faye (1997) have termed a 'pre- delinquent state' into a state of criminality. Street Children may also engage in prostitution and homosexuality, thereby putting themselves at serious risk of contracting and spreading HIV and AIDS, in addition to other health hazards (Kruger and Richter, 2003). It is because of the potential risks they pose to society at large that the situation of street children needs to be given far greater attention than has hitherto been the case.According to Ross (1991), the majority of street children in South Africa are black and normally aged between 13 and 14 years - a legacy of the apartheid period. However, Van Niekerk (1990) argues that it is unrealistic to explain the situation of street children in South Africa on the basis of a political system alone; rather the problem should be considered holistically. While Le Roux (1993), identified family violence, parental alcoholism, abuse, poverty and personal reasons as to why many children live on the streets, Keen (1990) identified broken homes, alcoholism, violence and desertion by family as some of the factors contributing to street children. …

A Narrative Search for Respect

This article examines narratives of the self used by stigmatized people searching for respect on the streets of Oslo, Norway. The three narratives—“it was my own choice,” “I'm decent,” and “we're the same”—are embedded in conventional discourse. They are utilized in claims to be morally decent selves. Three different narratives—“I'm interesting,” “I'm smart,” and “I'm dangerous”—are embedded in the gangster discourse of a violent street subculture. They are utilized in order to appear as fascinating and competent. This ambivalent presentation of self challenges concepts such as “the code of the street” and “street culture.”

Mothers and Daughters

ABSTRACT In many inner-city households, children are simultaneously exposed to substance use, violence, and sexual exploitation. Sadly, these youths often seek solace and escape in the inner-city street subculture, only to find the same problems there. As young adults, these persons typically reproduce the household norms and the street subculture they experienced in their own childhoods. This paper illustrates the processes behind these interconnected phenomena based on detailed ethnographic accounts of two generations of females' experiences from two separate households.

Early onset of alcohol use and health problems: spurious associations and prevention

The association between age at onset of drinking and subsequent alcohol-related consequences, including alcohol dependence, is well established in the literature. Although the vast majority of these studies are based on cross-sectional analyses, the association finds support in longitudinal studies (Andersen et al. 2003). The follow-up periods in longitudinal studies, however, tend to be of short duration, limited in number and include large proportions of respondents who have not passed through the risk period for developing alcohol use disorders. Alcohol use tends to increase during the adolescent years until about 21–23 years of age before leveling off and, for the majority, decreasing thereafter. The normative decline in heavy drinking with increasing age has been associated with the assumption of adult behaviors (e.g. employment, marriage, parenting, etc.). Comparable age trajectories of alcohol-related consequences and other problem behaviors suggest a categorization of substance abuse as ‘adolescent-limited’ and ‘life-course persistent’ (Moffitt 1993). Irrespective of these categorizations, early onset of drinking provides a powerful behavioral context in risk exposure among adolescents and young adults, prompting many in the health field to suggest that delaying the onset of alcohol and other drug use is a critical component in the development of preventive and educational efforts. While early users have greater potential for problems, Robins (1984) cautions that early onset may be an indicator of other psychiatric disorders and is not a direct factor in subsequent problem manifestation. Other studies indicate that the question is indeed much more complicated. Aside from psychiatric disorders, precursors of early onset have been related to personality (i.e. impulsivity), social class (i.e. early detachment from educational pursuits), differential association (i.e. street subculture) and social structure (alcohol availability). Donovan & Jessor (1985) proposed that the associations between problem drinking with other problem behaviors such as poor school performance, precocious sexual behavior, illicit drug use, etc. comprise a single behavioral syndrome which has ties to the broader social environment. Elucidation of the role of precursors in problem behavior must also address the nature of the mediation between precursors and behavioral outcomes. For example, Bates & Labouvie (1997) demonstrate that early risk behaviors have indirect effects on later alcohol-related problem consequences (i.e. the association between early risk factors and subsequent consequences are mediated by the intensity of current use). The paper from Andersen et al. (2003) reveals that intensity of alcohol use at age 15 predicts excessive consumption at age 19 and directs attention to identifying factors which sustain the increase in drinking behavior. Prescott & Kendler (1999) offer evidence which suggests that early onset and alcohol dependence are both manifestations of a general vulnerability to problem behavior and argue that attempts to prevent the development of alcohol dependence by delaying drinking onset are unlikely to be successful. Because much of the literature on earlier onset is based on secondary analyses in which many critical variables are absent, the complete picture awaits further study. This by no means implies that preventive and educational efforts related to early onset of drinking must remain on hold. While educational efforts appear to have limited impact, social control policies which curb alcohol availability have been shown to be effective interventions. Of course, it remains to be seen whether fuller understanding of the aforementioned associations will lead to more effective prevention.

Street Youth and Criminal Violence

This research examines the roles of various subcultural, economic, and victimization factors in the violent behavior of 200 homeless male street youths. Findings reveal that factors associated with the street subculture, including long-term homelessness and criminal peers, increase the respondent's risk for violence on the street and provide rules concerning honor, protection, and retribution. However, the heavy use of drugs and alcohol on the street plays only a minor role in explaining violent behavior in this population, and the violence associated with these substances appears to be recreational. Findings also suggest that minimal economic resources and perceptions of a blocked opportunity structure also leave the youths at risk for various violent activities. Results also indicate that victimization on the street and a history of physical abuse in the home are related to the respondents' violent behavior. Results are discussed in terms of different types of violent behavior.

The art of the body: Aboriginal and Torres strait islander youth subcultural practices

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students have traditionally encountered less academic success than non‐Aborigines. While there has been considerable research into school based factors for indigenous academic success, few studies have examined the impact of peers and leisure activities of these youths which are primarily found outside the school. This paper uses the poststructuralist concept of the body to examine how the members of one North Queensland Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander subculture derive pleasure through the production of aerosol art similar to African—American and Rastafarian street subcultures. It is argued that schools could incorporate some of the elements of subcultures in the formal curriculum as one way of preventing indigenous students from dropping out of school, thereby increasing their chances of attaining greater academic success.

The street addict role: a theory of heroin addiction

This book provides a new answer to the question, Why do people use heroin and other street drugs? Drawing upon a growing body of studies of drug users conducted by sociologists and anthropologists, it attempts to integrate their findings into a theoretically unified sociocultural explanation of heroin use. The theory, which draws heavily upon the insights of symbolic interactionist and role theory, posits that there is a street subculture of heroin users. The chief role in this subculture -- the street addict role -- becomes a blueprint for living for many heroin users. Addicts are heavily committed to this role and organize their behavior and self-identification around it. From this basic starting point, the theory explains how persons become and remain addicts and how they may eventually give up addictive behavior. Table of Contents 1. Introduction 2. The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective 3. Towards a Role Theoretic Model of Heroin Use 4. Becoming and Being a Street Addict 5. Individualistic Explanations for Heroin Use 6. Origins of the Street Addict Role 7. Treatment for the Street Addict 8. What Is To Be Done

Crime as a negotiated commodity: The police use of informers

Criminologists have long been interested in the relationship between policing and community participation. Traditionally, it has been argued that law enforcement agencies are dependent upon the general community for crime information. Recently, however, there is a growing interest among criminologists to explore the dependency relations police create within different subpopulations, especially diverse street subcultures.

Victimization of the mentally ill: an unintended consequence of deinstitutionalization.

Twenty years ago, legal interventions and dramatic advancements in psychopharmacology provided the impetus for a mass exodus from public mental health institutions to community settings. This well-intended move was predicated on the development of a community mental health center network. An unintended consequence, however, is that many deinstitutionalized mentally ill clients have been forced onto the street with little or no treatment. Moreover, a new wave of never treated youth and elderly have joined the street subculture. Without adequate clinical treatment, these people are vulnerable to victimization and to arrest and incarceration. In this article, the history of the problem is reviewed and steps to create a more responsive clinical network to cope with the problem are discussed.