Abstract
This article describes the ways in which the formerly incarcerated participants understand “hustling” and the “hustle.” Based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted at Second Chance, a New York metropolitan area agency that serves formerly incarcerated persons and those who have had police contact, this article attempts to situate “hustling” within the carceral state. “Hustling” has a range of meanings. It is a form of labor performed to acquire material goods—the ability to “hustle” functions as a marker of an approved masculinity. “Hustling” also reflects power relations and can serve as a framework of reference. The participants in the study were routinely “hustled,” and they expressed concern that they were being “hustled” in the context of the programming offered at Second Chance. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of the findings for reentry programming.
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Notes
“Soft skills” or “life skills” refers to “skills, abilities and traits that pertain to personality, attitude, and behavior” (Moss and Tilly 1996: 256).
Most New York State prisons are located north of the five boroughs of New York City, usually within a three- to eight-hour drive.
I was used to the economic strategies used by poor people in Upstate New York, such as growing marijuana, poaching deer, and running unlicensed daycares—activities that people engaged in when money was tight.
Katz’s (2015) formulation of “analytic induction” involves a process of examining negative cases and using the negative cases to refine the researcher’s hypothesis.
At Second Chance, “job developers” perform a number of duties. They conduct cold calls and meet with prospective employers. They serve as mentors as participants go through their job search and they conduct mock interviews.
Many of the participants did not have bank accounts and cash deposits could prove problematic (see Dewan 2014).
The jobs that prisons provided were so important to these areas that local officials in the Adirondack area and Washington County were very worried about impact of the closures proposed by Governor Andrew Cuomo in 2011 (Alexander 2011).
Their analyses were likely informed by the presence of the Resurrection and Conciencia Study Groups in the New York State prison system. These activist groups were heavily influenced by the Black Panther Party and the Young Lords. In addition, some of the older men were contemporaries of Eddie Ellis, Larry White, and other activists or had come up in a prison system influenced by their activism.
Wile E. Coyote is the “Looney Tunes” character who chases the Road Runner. He is constantly coming up with harebrained schemes and typically ends up falling off a cliff or having a rock land on his head.
“Pull-ups” are a common practice in programs in which participants are required to inform staff if other participants break the rules, or they are expected to offer criticisms of other participants.
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Caputo-Levine, D. Deconstructing the Hustle: Investigating the Meanings of Hustling Within the Carceral State. Crit Crim 30, 267–284 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-020-09540-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-020-09540-2