When reading this chapter, I remembered something from last semester's Literary Theory class: A discussion about authority and legitimacy of graffiti was discussed one day. Who is to say if a streetcar tagged with graffiti is a more or less legitimate form of art than a Van Gogh painting? Also, who is to say that a poem of sorts scribbled on the side of an abandoned building in New York is less important than one of Shakespeare’s sonnet? I think the question of authority and legitimacy runs deep into a lot of reasons and causes for a gang to be formed in the first place. I think that is the most important thing to try and understand. Cintron, basically, says it is for respect. For example, a person of Latino origins growing up in an American society will not feel like he is respected nor will he respect others not of his background and shared belief system. It is more about a power struggle than anything. Cintron addresses this idea of a power struggle and how the ones in power and the ones trying to subvert said power are actually on the same team; They need each other to, ultimately, identify themselves. This concept made me think of Foucault and his idea of there only being one power at be and the constructs and the subverts are actually on the same team, both tangled in the perputual illusion that each are at odds with another; I digress. So, what does separate a gang member from a Phd? Nothing, really.
Looked at in an askew manner, one could equate the gangs of L.A. to individuals in the academic community; The English Department has certain words and phrases that only a few really understand and could be considered a “gang.” Of course, there isn't any violence or criminal activity, but the underlying structures are comparable. A rhetoric/composition person(s) wants respect and to be legitimized so he/she creates a paper (graffiti) that may “call out” the literature people or, perhaps, show flaws in a certain school of thought he/she doesn't agree with. It's all about the underlying structures and how responses to these structures manifest themselves. To some, it is a subtle symbol spray painted on a wall; to others, a paper delivered at an MLA panel. If you deconstruct the gang symbol and the formal rhetoric and composition paradigm, one can see how they are actually one in the same. One utterance heard in the vast distance of the universe, both struggling to convey meaning and find like minds to seek some form of identity.
