# Writing American Slums/Ghettos



## Crying (Sep 24, 2014)

So NaNoWriMo is coming up and I'm desparately looking for a plot. I have one idea that I might write an urban fantasy set in an American slum/ghetto, but I'm not really sure where to start! Does anyone have any ideas of:

Places that might be good settings for a crime-ridden sort of area, akin to Detroit or South Bronx (before the start of their gentrification that is)?
How a slum/ghetto/generally bad neighborhood looks different at first glance from a safe/gentrified neighborhood?
I want to be accurate in my portrayal to avoid turning this into a caricature, but I'm not sure where to start research. I hope this made sense, but feel free to comment questions if I'm not being clear enough. Thanks, all!


----------



## Terry D (Sep 24, 2014)

Some internet searching will show you lots of images of inner city areas, and you should be able to find articles and memoirs for further education. Use Google Earth to find specific locations in the area you choose. In my most recent book I set part of it in East St. Louis Il. Several scenes were constructed around landmarks I found using Google Earth.


----------



## Deleted member 56686 (Sep 24, 2014)

There are a lot of areas in Baltimore (and I suspect many other cities) where you see loads of boarded up houses. You might see some seedy looking characters on street corners. The key of these areas is that they are all so poverty stricken and they are often ignored by government officials preferring to spend their time on catering to the more affluent (i.e. the gentrified sections in town). In general the poverty stricken areas are much more run down and dirtier than the more affluent neighborhoods.


----------



## ActionHeroTrainee (Sep 24, 2014)

Why does the slum/ghetto have to be in Detroit or New York?  Pretty much any city is going to have the lower socioeconomic neighborhoods, government subsidized housing, etc.  What constitutes a ghetto?  How much worse (or less worse) is one over another?  The slums in Podunk, Iowa are probably not as bad as the slums in Detroit, but they still share similarities.  

I bring this up because if you're not familiar with what really goes on in the 'hood, but determined to write about it anyway, maybe picking an area you can better relate to would be the wiser move.  My guess is Chapel Hill, NC has a part of town you wouldn't want to live, and if you've never driven through the worst part of it your first experience doing so might provide some vivid first impressions.

Then, to avoid turning it into caricature (very commendable) talk to someone who circulates between worlds.  Ministers, cops, social workers, utility workers, firefighters and EMS personnel.  Trust me, let enough people know you're writing a book and you'll have more opinions, impressions, and stories than you can shake a stick at.  

Get a balanced view.  "Those people have no respect for other peoples property" should be tempered with "Imagine what it feels like being a single parent trying to feed a family and getting a letter stating your food stamps are being cut because they didn't receive a form they didn't tell you they needed in the first place."

Understand that being a member of a criminal street gang is a bad thing.  Now imagine what you would do if you got beaten up regularly for not being a member of their gang.  Would it make sense to band together with others in the same situation for self protection?  Sort of like ... forming a gang?

Then imagine what it's like being a firefighter and being awakened at 2:30 in the morning because someone needs a ride to the hospital for a minor ailment they've had for three days and they call you because the ambulance ride is cheaper (for them) than having to put gas in their cousin's car (and buy him/her alcohol and/or tobacco) in exchange for a ride.  (And by the way, 2:30 isn't an unusual time for them to be awake and calling someone for a ride.)

But they're calling on their very own cell phone (their plan cost less than yours thanks to a benevolent government that doesn't want to see them left behind) and they have a flat screen television bigger than yours.

Oh, and their 13 year old daughter hasn't been home in three days, but the cops can't find her to make her come home because people in that neighborhood will let someone who killed one of their own remain at large before they'd help the cops with anything.

Half because they fear retribution for being seen talking to cops.  The other half, because they've been taught to hate cops.

Caricatures?  Maybe.  Talk to some people then let us know.


----------



## hvysmker (Sep 24, 2014)

I have a novel where I needed my heroine and a friend to move into a slum and high drug area in Dallas, Texas.  Now, I've never been to Texas. I do have a brother living there, no way he could help.

From being in many large cities, I found a way.  First, I Googled for several large businesses that were headquartered in Dallas.  Most seemed to be centered in a certain area.  To me, that indicated the largest business section of that town.

Next, I googled a detailed map of the city.  Now, there have been some similarities in every large city I'd spent much time in.  One is that there has always been a slummy area within a few blocks of a business section.

That's for two reasons.  Low-paid employees from the large stores and corporations need a place nearby to live and can't afford expensive housing.  Also, land speculators buy cheaply on the outskirts of business sections. Consortium’s, for instance, buy up entire city  blocks, holding them for resale.  Meanwhile, they at least partially maintain the buildings, usually farming them out to management corporations. They figure it's cheaper to rent them out for whatever the market will bear than to tear the buildings down and pay taxes on empty lots.

Those areas are typified by the old streets, often cull-de-sacs and short streets.  New skyscrapers typically take large blocks of land, no short ones.

Once I found the short streets, looking somewhat like Hong Kong property, I had my slum and drug area.  Noting the names of some of those streets, I chose one for my protagonists to live on and buy their drugs.  Easier to do than read about it, he-he.

I even had one long-time Dallas resident ask me how long and where I lived in Dallas. It fooled her.

Charlie


----------



## hvysmker (Sep 24, 2014)

By the way,  Crying, I thought of other points you might have use for. These are while travelling.

Since this is a research thread, you might be interested in a few more suggestions for your story or general use.

1. While travelling, I'm usually careful with my money.  When I'm waiting between flights, and want to eat, I don't use the normal airport concessions. I reject paying $15 or $20 for a hamburger and fries.  Instead I ask a floor sweeper or other low-paid employee for the "cheap" restaurant.  There's usually one maintained for them. It may be below street level, near a  back entrance, but is technically available to everybody. Prices there will be somewhat at McD's.

2. When staying overnight, I'll ask the taxi driver to take me to a good hotel.  When we get there, I'll tell doorman or clerk that I'll be back in a little while. I always carry a short chain and padlock with me.  I'll either leave my bags with them or, if possible, lock them to a sturdy object within their sight.  These days I might have to open them to show no bombs inside. Then I'll walk around the  building, find a cheap hotel,  get my bags and go there.    So far, I've never been disappointed.  That chain and padlock also saves money when waiting, saving the cost of a locker.

3.  I always carry my own door lock with me. You can pick them up at any lock store. With them I can lock my own hotel  door with my own lock.  That deters hotel thieves.  If the hotel staff objects, what are they going to do? Tell me when I'm checking out?  

Charlie


----------



## sailorguitar (Sep 25, 2014)

In any American city you can find slums.  My advice would be to pick one and walk through the slums, projects.  Memphis is a cheap place for motels, New Orleans.... there's tons of 'em in our plentiful country.  I think you should get a feel for them other than checking them out online.  East Hastings Street in Vancouver B.C..... stay at the Canby hostel and take a walk.  You need to be there...


----------



## patskywriter (Sep 25, 2014)

I moved from a diverse, middle-class neighborhood in Chicago to an all (well, mostly) black so-called ghetto and would still be there if I'd hadn't moved to Durham NC to care for my elderly aunt. One nuance that most members of the media and many people in general miss is that ghetto ≠ "bad neighborhood." When you make that assumption you miss out on the opportunity to notice and acknowledge the positive aspects of living in a neighborhood like Woodlawn. You might be able to write a compelling story that will sound "true enough" for your readers, but it would ring hollow for someone living in the area the story is set in.

Try not to automatically adopt the assumptions that most people you know might hold. I remember back in the 1970s/80s when the Chicago Transit Authority was in financial distress, people called for the elimination of the "el" stops in certain neighborhoods (all poor and black). After all, they said, it seemed that the people in those neighborhoods never used the trains—the platforms were almost always empty. Well, it just so happened that a friend of mine wanted to try busking during morning rush hour, which meant taking the train downtown at 5 in the morning. To our shock, the platforms in "those neighborhoods" were packed and we could barely squeeze onto the train. What we (and apparently lots of folks) didn't know was that what later became known as the "working poor" operate on a whole different schedule as they go to and from factory jobs in the suburbs and beyond. … Which leads to another obvious admonishment—don't assume poor people don't work or don't want to work. They work, but they don't hold jobs that pay decent salaries.


----------



## midnightpoet (Sep 25, 2014)

hvysmker said:


> I have a novel where I needed my heroine and a friend to move into a slum and high drug area in Dallas, Texas.  Now, I've never been to Texas. I do have a brother living there, no way he could help.
> 
> From being in many large cities, I found a way.  First, I Googled for several large businesses that were headquartered in Dallas.  Most seemed to be centered in a certain area.  To me, that indicated the largest business section of that town.
> 
> ...



Well, I'd be interested in reading your novel; I lived the first 60 years of my life in and around Dallas and my first three novels were set there.


----------



## hvysmker (Sep 25, 2014)

I have the file, midnight poet.  I could send it to you but the IM would take forever. Unfortunetly I don't have it in e-book format or on Amazon.  I put them novels on with one spurt of energy. At the time, the novel was being serialized on: http://metahumanpress.com/mhp/2012/06/13/shoaki-girl-20-meili-arrives-in-the-united-states/
I had to sign onto the site, so I don't know if you'd have to. The site stopped updating about a year ago.

Anyway, with that site having rights, I didn't include it on the e-book submissions.

It's about a half-chinese, half-caucasion girl born in a little village in China around 1940. The village has a school that teaches martial arts, supposedly the granddaddy of them all. It gives her certain powers, such as teleportation and changing the mass of her body.  When her father is  killed by the Communists, she heads for the US to work for the government.

Charlie


----------



## midnightpoet (Sep 25, 2014)

Thanks, I'll look into it.:icon_cheesygrin:


----------



## hvysmker (Sep 25, 2014)

Lemme know what you think of it, Midnight Poet.

Sorry for hijacking your thread, Crying. I didn't mean to do it.

Charlie


----------



## sailorguitar (Sep 26, 2014)

I've had to think about this a bit.  

It sounds like you are looking for a setting and want to portray the experience of living in a slum as real as possible.  Move to one would be the best advice.  Learn about it from direct experience.  This may not be particle, practical.  

How a slum ghetto looks different at first glance from a gentrified neighborhood should be pretty clear upon first sight.  

You are looking at an American/western slum.... Detroit sounds pretty good, I've never been there.  I remember a neighborhood of melting cardboard and plywood polygons in San Diego in the 80's, migrant workers picking apples in Eastern Washington, fishermen living out of trailers and squealing for crack along the coast of Oregon, black "ghettos" in almost every major American city I've been to, gunshots, and a lot of honest and dishonest people.  

Shouldn't be hard to experience.  Hitch up your pants, grab a beer and off you go....


----------



## Ariel (Sep 26, 2014)

I find most of these posts slightly offensive as I grew up in (still live in) a "ghetto."

1) If you're looking at a Midwestern ghetto like the one I live in you'll see something called "urban prairie."  It's a phenomenon wherein the buildings in a neighborhood have been systematically abandoned (often after a drug bust), torn down, and allowed to grow wild.  

In the last ten years there have been seven houses on my block torn down--in the last twenty that number is as high as thirteen.  The result is that my neighborhood feels more rural than most and I live about five minutes from downtown Kansas City.

2) The people are just about as diverse as most other neighborhoods--now.  When I was a kid we were one of two "white" families in the area.   There are a lot more racially diverse ghettos since the housing bust as people are now just living where they can afford.  That said there is a marked difference between whites and other races in a ghetto.  Whites are more likely to have junk lying around.  I don't know why we do it but we do.

Also, racism is a thing--it occurs on all sides of race; and especially in a ghetto. If you're not of the predominant race you'll be met with some strange remarks--even from people of the same race.

3) There are some really nice houses amongst the poorly kept ones.  It really depends on if the owner lives in their house or if it's a rented (section eight) house.  There's also abandoned houses that are boarded up and falling in on themselves.

4) Drugs and violence are very real and it's very scary.  Prostitution is also very real.  No, the prostitutes don't hang out on a corner in skimpy clothes (most of the time in a residential district anyway--a busy business district they might).  No, it's not reported.

It isn't uncommon to know the perpetrators of a crime.  I knew of a major drug supplier in the neighborhood, several gang members, and at least two prostitutes.  

You don't turn them in.  They're your neighbors and sometimes your friends.  If you're seen talking to the police--well they know where you live.

Most drive-by shootings are done as retaliation and the victims are rarely the person who was the target.

5) Despite the violence and crime a lot of people are very religious and go to church on Sunday.  It may be a symptom of living in the Bible Belt (or close enough it doesn't matter) but there are ten churches in a 20-block radius).


----------



## hvysmker (Sep 26, 2014)

I  know what you mean, amsawtell. At the time I lived in Waikiki, it was in a ghetto atmosphere close to the beach.  My apartment complex included three old wooden two-story buildings, 24 one-room apartments total.  One time, when talking to the resident manager, I found only four of us actually worked for a living.  Many of the others were male hookers.  Next door, another apartment building housed mostly female ones, he-he. It was a dangerous neighborhood, though no teenage gangs.  So bad that police liked to park in front of my place to sit and talk when not busy somewhere else.

I was a computer programmer and alcoholic, most of my pay going for drink. Having recently returned from Vietnam, the dangerous atmosphere didn't bother me. I was fairly young and figured I could take care of myself.

That was, of course, before the housing bust, every building full to capacity. After all, it was Hawaii.

I tried to stay friendly with the local petty-criminals in the area, even to the extent of ... well, helping in small ways.  Nothing overt, no crimes. I was making a fair salary at the time.  I'd often drink with them, but made a point of staying out of criminal activity.  I'm certain you know what I mean.

Charlie


----------



## Ariel (Sep 26, 2014)

Be nice, mind your own business, and take no part--yep.


----------



## NerdyMJ (Sep 28, 2014)

I was raised in a ghetto, too, but it was in a small town. Not a big city, so it was actually right next to the suburbs. A lot of the people were either Hispanic or white. There was a lot of Catholicism in the area.The ghetto I lived was a lot less diversified than the amsawtell described and there wasn't anything in the way of the (serious) gang crimes while I was living there.  That being said I lived two doors down from a drug dealer and a child molester (child abuse happened very often), got used to watched to teenagers get high on their porch fronts, and watched the cops circle the projects every day. The walls were paper thin, so you hear literally everything that happened on the other side. I grew up listening to my neighbor screaming at her crying children. I wasn't allowed to go to the woods or to the park because that was where teenagers went to hook up and buy drugs at night. The worst part about living there were the looks you got from the people that lived in the suburbs right next door. I remember going to elementary school and hearing the parents whisper to their children, "Don't go near those kids. They're trash", while talking about my brother and I when they didn't even know us.


----------



## hvysmker (Sep 28, 2014)

I'm reminded of one aspect I haven't seen in these homeless threads. I mean the mobile homeless.   A lot of people without stable homes live out of their vehicles, cars and vans.  Many of them have low-level jobs.

In truth, depending on the weather and other circumstances, if you can afford the fuel, it isn't a bad living arrangement for an individual.

One one tour in Germany with the US Army, we'd often camp in the Grunwald forest for a week or so at a time.  I owned a Volkswagen Van and, being a sergeant, sometimes had advance knowledge of the exact location ahead of time.

I'd park my van near that spot. I had a cot inside, a tv, propane hot plate, small refrigerator, and other modern conveniences.  Then, when the company moved there and the others were sleeping in drafty tents and in the backs of trucks, I'd run an extension cord to my van and live in comfort.  Other NCOs and officers would park in the same area and simply sneak out to go home at night.  I didn't want the travel time or to waste money on fuel, so I slept there.

A homeless individual could easily live in relative comfort in a vehicle, saving money by not renting a room somewhere.

Charlie


----------

