Ethan FosseThe Cultural Matrix: Understanding Black Youth

"The Cultural Matrix: Understanding Black Youth" is a comprehensive and detailed study of inner city poverty. The book details many programs- both successful and unsuccessful- which have been tried. For a reader who cares, but does not know how to begin understanding this segment of the populations' challenges I found this book very insightful. Best of all, the authors do give some positive suggestions for reform. I would highly recommend this book.With gratitude, Claire S. Cabot

Lot's of opinion and I substantiated "fact" ... certainly agenda driven. If you're looking for objectivity, keep looking.

This certainly is a scholarly book but not what I expected. Not light reading and probably better for someone doing research.

Good book

Didactic and scholarly. Good reference a true in depth study.

This is a very insightful book regarding Black youth behavior by many authors,,,,,,,A GOOD READ!!!

Great book!

"The Cultural Matrix – Understanding Black Youth", by way of essays from scholars who study black youths, presents Orlando Patterson’s longstanding argument that culture as well as economic, legal, political, and residential structure plays a role in influencing the behavior of young black people. It’s hard to argue with that; that culture and structure both matter – for any person or group – seems a truism. However, for a time, sociologists considered structure paramount, and culture irrelevant, or simply a consequence of structure. What is bracing about this work (and what is consistent with Dr. Patterson’s previous writings) is that while the authors acknowledge that black people face disadvantages, they do not absolve black people of responsibility for their own success or failure.Patterson and Ethan Fosse edit this insightful and nuanced collection of research-based essays describing the culture – Patterson would insist upon the plural “cultures” – of young black people, and especially poor, young black people. Patterson and Fosse write several of the chapters. There are chapters on, for example, the values of disconnected black youth, hip-hop’s dominance of youth culture, the role of religion, and gender relations among black men and women. Most salient for people like me who work on the reform end of things – I work in correctional psychiatry – are chapters about what, if anything, can be done to improve the situations of black youths. Thus there are also chapters on the effect of affluent suburban schooling, job skills training, encouraging committed relationships among new parents (a study with dismal results), and changing how colleges approach poor students in order to maximize the students’ chances of graduating.No surprise: there are no easy answers. On the other hand, the evidence suggests that some things work, such as nursing visits to young mothers. In the concluding chapter, Patterson recommends a mix of structural and cultural changes. I doubt we are going to see the overhaul of inner cities, the ending of segregation, and the jobs program that Patterson envisages. A more likely possibility, and one Patterson also recommends, is a substantial decline in the incarceration rate in our country, especially among young black men.Patterson also advocates for two parents in the home. He considers single-parent families a “national tragedy.” I agree. I have witnessed the disaster of single-parent (i.e. single mother) families nearly every day of my professional career, since my second year of medical school. I am concerned that single-parent families and excessive incarceration may feed upon themselves in a vicious cycle.Patterson’s and Fosse’s work aspires to popular readership, but may be too big – its heft qualifies it as a "tome" – and too laden with sociological jargon and constructs to maintain the attentions of non-professional readers. (Terms such as “diachronically”, “keying”, and “priming” are an eye-rolling reminder that we are reading sociologists using big, abstract words to describe the everyday behaviors of everyday people.) On the other hand, The Cultural Matrix is accessible and even enjoyable to policymakers, educators, and clinicians – the people in position to learn from this formidable work, and consider and enact its recommendations.