Traumatic Human Development In The Movie Boyz N The Hood

The film Boyz ‘n the Hood, directed by John Singleton is more than just a Hollywood blockbuster. The film incorporates numerous criminological theories and also demonstrates the concepts of conformity and deviance. This paper will analyze the characters of Tre, Ricky, Doughboy, Furious and other friends and family and show how criminological theories and the concepts of conformity and deviance play a part in their lives.

In the narrative: Boyz ‘r’ us by Scott Monk, we comprehend the author’s depiction of Mitch. That he is an incorrigible young adolescent with many obligations, upon his shoulders. We perceive that Mitch is confined within a gang, a gang that is pessimistically changing his life, it is also having disdainful influence on his deportments and it is carrying out that influence with him in his life. We are exposed to the theme of change in Mitch’s life when encountering some drastically different: characters, setting, situations and outcomes. The author certifies Mitch’s life one-step at a time, by exploring the depth of Mitch’s predicaments, in other accounts; inquiring into the theme of adolescent etiquettes and by positioning us in the centre of the contingencies.

In Always Running, Luis J. Rodriguez recalls his time growing up in Los Angeles during the 60s and 70s. Rodriguez writes of the hardships that his family had first encountered while trying to assimilate into American society and how he would often, while growing up, be criminalized by his teachers, law enforcement, other people, his peers, his community, and eventually people who cared most for him. Rodriguez recalls the times where he and some friends came together and created a family, a brotherhood of sort, in order to fulfill his need of belonging, but as other people in the community had also formed groups to consolidate power, thus marked the beginning of rivalry and the introduction of gangs. Rodriguez’s gang life had been filled with tragedies and filled with great times, but ultimately he tried to leave the life of crime and commit to an education. Rodriguez tried stepping away from the gang lifestyle by going to school and writing poetry, but ended up back in the life of crime after a serious altercation with the police. When Rodriguez went back to his gang lifestyle, he found the same gang that treated him as a brother, had shunned him away after Rodriguez had offered a solution to wither away the gang violence.

Through the narrative “The Scholarship Boy” I find few turning points that I notice a shift in the demeanor of Richard Rodriguez as well as how I perceive the story. First of all, it is made apparent to me that people acknowledge him for his successes by making remarks such as, “Your parents must be proud” or “How did you manage it? According to the opening paragraphs Rodriguez is seen as a model student. Although this may be true, the first turning point I find suggests otherwise as Rodriguez conveys, “For although I was a very good student, I was also a very bad student…Always successful, always unconfident. Exhilarated by my process. Sad.” This quote changed my perspective of Rodriguez because of the negative emotion he expresses toward his family. By the same token, I recall my sister being an outstanding achiever throughout school, yet, she was similarly depressed as well as annoyed towards me and the rest of our family. This flashback assisted me in relating to Rodriguez’s emotions towards his successes. In the same fashion, I am supplied a grasp of his shift in tone and direction in the narrative.

In the movie “Boyz in the Hood” director John Singleton, paints a clear image of the problems that happen very often in the African American communities. The movie deals with issues such as: the importance of a father in a young man’s life, the ongoing violence of black on black crime, and how black people are put in situations where they are put to fail and not succeed in life.

Throughout the 1992 film, “Boyz in the Hood,” John Singleton takes a closer look at urban black America in South Central Los Angeles. Doughboy, Ricky and Trey, along with their parents are chronicled from childhood to adulthood. Each person, though living in the same neighborhood chooses different paths in life. These characters were raised in a very deviant community, however there were many causes as to why they did not all become deviant. Deviance is defined as behavior that goes against what is socially acceptable. It is when a person disregards what is normal in a specific society and acts upon it. Throughout the movie these characters had many chances to engage in deviant behavior, as some did while

The boy’s in “Blackrock” often partake in risk taking behaviour in order to gain respect within their group and this can lead to a detrimental gang mentality. In the third scene Jared reveals to his friend Rachel why he is so loyal to his good friend Ricko. “He’s been my mate since forever...” he says, with the use of emotive dialogue and colloquial language. The authenticity conveyed through the emotive and colloquial language shows the seemingly positive impact that Ricko has had on Jared. After his Dad “split” he didn’t have a male role model and was what he called a “total fuck-up” or someone to guide him in the hyper-masculine world. He found security in Ricko and in return Jared defends Ricko at all costs, this shows the encouraging aspects of mateship, where boys can find sense of belonging in their friendships. However, Jared’s idealisation of Ricko blinds him to the realities of his aggressive personality.

Eventually Richard Rodriguez develops bitterness towards his parents. For being uneducated and ignorant, His thirst for knowledge has transformed him into someone who holds a distain for those without knowledge or esteem. Then he transforms into someone who feels guilt over his success. His family life has turned into an atypical situation where there is very little closeness between him and the other members of his family. This is caused by his increasing want to distance himself from what he believes to be uneducated.

In the 1991 drama “Boyz in the Hood”, Written and Directed by John Singleton. He successfully attempts to portray what life was like and in some areas in America still is for African Americans living in a rough Los Angeles neighborhood. It displays a portrait of the harsh realities that plagues the black community and by displaying uninviting living conditions that is South Central L.A, Singleton aims to share to the world the self-destructive deviant behavior that is to this day, destroying the African American community. Some of the self-destructive deviant behaviors include gang life, selling drugs, and gun violence. Various issues are displayed in this movie involving the black community including deviance, poverty, gentrification, the importance of a father in a young man’s life and black on black crime. Singleton displays a tale of three friends growing up in the “hood”, plagued by drugs and violence and layers textures over rough and compelling visuals of black culture that shows us what it means to come to maturity, or die trying, as a black male. In this essay, I will be giving a thorough analysis of the film, as well as covering certain points from the movie from a sociological perspective to explain why singleton chose to write this film.

Discusses how race is a conceptualized concept most often through stereotypes of different groups with the presence of a systematic structure of racism where the dominant group has placed themselves as superior and all other groups are deemed inferior. This structure often produces a negative impact on same race relations. Identity, according to this theory is created due to psychological enforcement of repeated racial oppression. The movie “Boyz N’ The Hood” demonstrates the effect of this enforced systematic structure and its negative impact on same race relations which lead to the ultimate death of some of the characters in this film (Singleton,1991). The movie takes place in impoverished South Central Los Angeles and depicts scenes of violence perpetrated by gangs against the main characters of the movie. Janet Helms points out that racial theory consists of four models White Identity, Black Identity, People of Color, and the Racial interaction model. She points out that the more an individual becomes aware of the social constructs of race and the racist system the closer

Additionally, in Merton’s modes of adaption, Tre can be seen as a conformist. Merton maintains that conformity is the most common method used to adapt to strain (Merton, 1938: 677). Although Tre drifts between conformity and deviance, he is most notably recognized as a conforming character. Unlike Doughboy who rejects both means and goals, Tre strives to obtain the ultimate goal of wealth through approved means of working at a clothing store in the mall. Also, Ricky demonstrates Tre’s conforming behaviour when he says, “I’ve got this friend named Tre that’s always talking about going into business and all” (Singleton, 1991). Clearly, in strain theory, Tre is a conformist as he accepts both goals and the legitimate means to achieve those goals.

Boyz in the Hood starts off with the character Tre Styles as a young man who lives in South Central, Los Angeles with his mom Rita. The social work student viewed this beginning portion of the movie portraying his young life as a social worker. The social work student noticed that Tre lived with his mother in an apartment in a rough neighborhood. Tre went to school but had problems acting out and being the class clown. Tre and the friends he hung around here had foul language and used profanity as young kids. This is just one example of how Tre’s surroundings influenced his life. According to Newman & Newman (2014), the Social Role theory suggests that a person learns behaviors from observing in their environments. Young Tre Styles learned profanity from somewhere in his rough environment and this is a method of learning socially. Rita, his mother was working on her Master’s degree and wanted better for Tre, so it is unlikely she promoted the use of profanity in her household. A contract between the two was drafter and Tre agreed with his mother that if he did not behave he would move in with his father. Rita stayed true to the contract they drafted and took Tre to live with his father Furious, so Tre could learn how to be a man.

Overall, BOYZ N THE HOOD AND DO THE RIGHT THING showcase the dysfunction among inner-city blacks during the 1990’s. Both films have something to say about Amercian society, and have a message (or warning) to other black men. Society views young black inner-city men as a lost cause, their only hope for success is to strive for something better. To succeed these men must avoid the temptations of the ‘hood, and get an education and motivate

The character that I had chosen to analyze was Ponyboy Curtis in the movie, The Outsiders (Coppola, 1983). I chose this character because the movie revealed how Ponyboy got to where he is mentally and everything that had occurred to get him to that point. I will analyze the adolescent phase of Ponyboy’s life. The theme of The Outsiders is how love can affect the relationships of close friends. The theories and theorists that support my analysis are Erik Erikson’s Psychosocial theory, Albert Bandura’s Observational Learning, Lev Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Perspective and Urie Bronfenbrenner’s Systems theory: Microsystem (Sigelman, 2015). From those theories and theorists the following points will be analyzed: identity, peer pressure, self-worth, and dependence.

All three individuals lived in the lower-class, and due to low income, some were faced with crime as an economic motive others took a different course. In the case of Ricky, he chose used football in order to aid him in getting into university. Meanwhile, Doughboy is shown to have little ambition, and a lack of parental support, this caused him to easily assimilate into the environment from the “hood”.