By page three of Kozol's excerpt from "Amazing Grace" I recognized the intersections depicted of race, class, age, health and ability. Kozol, when talking about the neighborhood around St. Ann's, mentions high use of heroin and other drugs, children who cannot sleep and are burdened with anxiety, depression and other mental health issues, asthma, and high rates of murder and other crimes. Kozol states that if there is a more dangerous area for children to live in the United States, he doesn't know what it is. When children grow up in environments like these that have unpredictable violence leading to these sorts of mental and physical health problems, it's easy to see how they would be candidates for early mortality, suicide, drug use and more. When you are taught that your own home is dangerous due to pollution and crime, recognizing even if only subconsciously that the world is a scary and unpredictable place, it makes it difficult to grasp what is beautiful and worth living for. Police officers start to look like monsters, not people who are supposed to protect you. Parents don't seem like providers. Things become bleak and hopeless, and this is an underlying point Kozol is trying to make in this piece.
Kozol states at the end of page three, “…do they think that they deserve this? What is it that enables some of them to pray? When they pray, what do they say to God?” This is a poignant question, because it’s known by sociologists and other professionals who study religion and poverty, that working class communities and/or communities of color tend to be very religious. bell hooks has written pieces on why this is, stating that when living in communities that face lots of the problems listed above, prayer and faith can easily become the only sources of solace and hope for their people and the future. Simple treasures have infinite worth, such as crosses and churches- or the chairs trash picked by a woman referenced on page eleven. Kozol goes on to talk about the massive presence of children in St. Ann’s parish, referencing one little boy named Cliffe, who’s mother warns Kozol that he fibs often. Perhaps this is also common, a way for children to escape the realities of the world they live in through make believe and storytelling. Cliffe then begins to talk about how he saw a boy shot in the head near a particular tree, in a “not particularly sad” way, then quickly changing the subject to ask the author if he wants a chocolate chip cookie.
It’s clear that Cliffe is not lying about this incident, but has internalized it as normal, so normal that he can immediately think about cookies after death. This is proven by the following conversation, when Cliffe tells the author that there is an incinerator burning bodies down one of the streets, a seven year old’s understanding of an incinerator made to burn amputated limbs, syringes and other waste from a hospital. Reaching for his inhaler moments later, I feel sad as I continue to read, recognizing the asthma and internalized grief I’ve experienced in some parts of Providence growing up, though I’ve been privileged enough to only attend schools and events in these areas and being exposed to them temporarily rather than living inside of it and dealing with smog and the smell of burning bodies on a regular basis. Providence is a lot like the train in Manhattan referenced at the beginning of the piece in that way- in a matter of bus or train stops you can get from the East Side to the South Side of Providence- seemingly, two very different worlds and cultures. Not the kind of inequality and worlds described in Kozol’s piece, but a connection I felt was noteworthy.
When Kozol asks Cliffe who his heroes are and he responds with Michael Jackson and Oprah, but says he doesn’t know who George Washington is, I think of Bordeiu’s theories on different kinds of capital- since Cliffe clearly hasn’t had too much of a good education (cultural capital) but his heroes are both Black people reflecting his identity back to him as a boy and he has a big family since he runs into multiple “cousins” (is this social capital? I think so.). People get self worth out of affection and connections to families and media, and I consider that social capital, however limited it may be.
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