NCJ Number
196826
Journal
Journal of Ethnicity in Substance Abuse Volume: 1 Issue: 3 Dated: 2002 Pages: 75-92
Date Published
2002
Length
18 pages
Annotation
This study developed an ethnographic sketch of psychoactive chemical use within a Hispanic "street corner" and "store-front" society in Brooklyn, NY.
Abstract
Classic accounts of street life emphasize clusters of people on corners and stoops, along with playgrounds and parks. The small business is also a nexus of interaction, including the barbershop in older African-American communities and the "bodega" or small grocery store in Hispanic districts. The Hispanic-owned bodegas in Brooklyn have managed to construct a stable adaptation through "regulars" and a peer culture and by employing a labor-intensive regimen and impaired "mascot" helpers. In the Brooklyn district that was the focus of this study, there were at least two bodegas on each block. One way they supplement their labor needs is to employ the services of local individuals who suffer from a variety of psychiatric and chemical dependency problems ("mascots"). To a certain extent, these "mascots" neutralize stigma by adopting an accepted role in the community through attachment to the bodegas. This paper provides three case studies of the mascot/employee arrangement at bodegas in Brooklyn. Erving Goffman's concept of "life as theater" is applied to this circumstance to show how the clients of the local methadone maintenance treatment program, the mentally ill, and chemically abusing individuals manage information about themselves through their roles as mascots/employees at the bodegas, which enables them to neutralize or disavow stigma in the community. 24 references