Deviance In America-Gangs

9 Pages 2167 Words

Originally the word gang had no negative connotation. In Old English, gang simply referred to a “number of people who went around together-a group.” Today a gang can be defined in four basic ways:
An organized group with a leader
A unified group that usually remains together during peaceful times as well as times of conflict
A group whose members show unity through clothing, language
A group whose activities are criminal or threatening to the larger society.
Gangs are one of the results of poverty, discrimination and urban deterioration. Some experts believe that young people, undereducated and without access to good jobs, become frustrated with their lives and join gangs as an alternative to boredom, hopelessness and devastating poverty. Studies have attempted to determine why gangs plague some communities but there has been no definitive answer. As a result, people working to solve gang problems have great difficulty. They find the situation overwhelming, and the violence continues.
Miller best defines what constitutes the make-up of a youth gang. Miller states:

“A youth gang is a self-forming association of peers, bound together by mutual interests, with identifiable leadership, wee-developed lines of authority, and other organizational features, who act in concert to achieve a specific purpose or purposes, which generally include the conduct of illegal activity and control over a particular territory, facility or type of enterprise.” (1)
No groups completely fitting the above description of gangs existed in America until the early 1800’s, but from the beginning of the European settlement in America there was gang-like activity, especially when class distinctions came into being. Gang members tended to be from the poorer classes and tended to be from the same race or ethnic background. They banded together for protection, recreation or financial gain.
In the early 1900’s the U.S. economy worsened, t...