Convertirse en El Más Malo: trayectorias masculinas de violencia en las pandillas de Medellín
Drawing upon forty life-history interviews with gang members in Medellín, Colombia, this paper argues that many young men join gangs to emulate and reproduce ‘successful’ local male identities. The accumulation by the gang of “masculine capital”, the material and symbolic signifiers of manhood, and...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | Spanish |
| Published: |
2018
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| Online Access: | https://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/oaiart?codigo=6717592 |
| Source: | Revista Estudios Socio-Jurídicos, ISSN 0124-0579, Vol. 20, Nº. 2, 2018, pags. 9-48 |
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| Summary: |
Drawing upon forty life-history interviews with gang members in Medellín, Colombia, this
paper argues that many young men join gangs to emulate and reproduce ‘successful’ local
male identities. The accumulation by the gang of “masculine capital”, the material and
symbolic signifiers of manhood, and accompanying stylistic and timely displays, means that
youths often perceive them to be spaces of male success, driving the social reproduction
of the gang. Once in the gang, they become increasingly “bad” using of violence to defend
the gang’s interests in exchange for masculine capital. Gang leaders, colloquially known
as duros or “hard men”, tend to be the más malo, the “baddest”. The “ganging process”
should not be understood in terms of aberrant youth behaviour, rather there is practical
logic to joining the gang as a site of identity formation for aspirational young men who are
coming-of-age when conditions of structural exclusion conspire against them |
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