Jay Macleod s Ethnography Ain t No Makin It, Sheds...

Jay Macleod’s ethnography, Ain’t No Makin It, sheds light on the institute of education in America and how the country’s capital economy both mirrors and produces inequality by creating hierarchies that make social mobility obsolete. He does this through the use of two groups of predominantly Caucasian and predominantly African American youth who reside in the same low income neighborhood and attend the same school. He soon learned that in contrast to the Hallway Hangers, the predominantly white group who for the majority believed that there was no escape from their socioeconomic background, the Brothers, the predominantly African American group do aspire to hold middle class jobs in the future that provided stable incomes and commit to long term relationships with significant others. However, in his pursuit to conclude his research on the two groups MacLeod found that with the exception of one or two, members from neither of the groups were able to climb up the social ladder and bring about change to their status. Although the two groups did share a common upbringing, they differed in race, beliefs, ideas, and attitudes and therefore their failure to achieve success cannot be seen as mutual. Discouraged by the loss of the male population in their neighborhood due to either prisons or death, the Hallway Hangers acquire a spirit of defeat and hopelessness for their future. The desire to graduate high school and attend college is nonexistent and instead, they decide that