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Home > Magazine > From Compton... From Compton to the Halls of Academia: Reflections on L.A. from a Chicano in the Educational Matrix By: Juan F. Carrillo (juancfile@yahoo.com), PhD Candidate, Florida State University I’m a 28 year old Chicano, a native of Compton, Lynwood, and other barrios in the same general area. I am now a PhD student in the southeast, armed with a vernacular and new prescription glasses by which to see planet L.A. During the 1990’s, I dodged bullets, saw my cousin murdered in my front yard and I recall a guy trying to sell me batteries and shoes after the L.A. riots. I remember Pete Wilson’s war on Mexicaness and the urban decay the lead to misguided anger. I recall the gangs, the prostitutes, the ravers, partying all night, robbing for kicks, and their mothers crying because they could not figure out where they went wrong. The biggest worry I have here, in the panhandle of Florida, is not running over a squirrel. I am so exotic here, a Mexican? Wow, that is cool! But from here, I look west, every day, wondering on how the social matrix developed and regenerates in the Los Angeles area. I have friends in south central L.A. that are still talking about their dreams, majestic as they are, but no vehicle exists to get there. What is in the air? Is Los Angeles an illusion, a place of metaphorical peaks, always cunning and seeking to pull the pride and hope right out of you, so that you can go awol? I talk to my L.A. familia all the time; sometimes I wish I can tape them. The noun and the predicate, the source of their information, is tainted with despair, so anxious, trembling with illusionary notions of destiny and happiness. Is L.A. la vida (life) or is L.A. a mentira (lie)? News Topics | Home | Research | History | Blood Gangs | Crip Gangs | People| Life in a Gang | Gallery | Iraqi Cards | Memorial | Migration | Graffiti | Resume| Injunctions Homicides | Maps | California Prisons | Contact

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