Column: That's so ghetto

Over and over again, one word resonates as I partake in my daily ritual: ghetto. "Oh my God that shirt is so ghetto," "Central is so ghetto," "You talk so ghetto," "Durham is ghetto," "BET (Black Entertainment Television) is ghetto," "Those boys were loud and ghetto," and my absolute, all-time favorite, "You have a ghetto booty." I've noticed that "ghetto" has become such a part of Duke students' vernacular that it's used for anything pertaining to a negative attribute, undesired trait and any stereotypical conception of class, hip hop culture and blackness. But, what does ghetto really mean?

Historically ghetto has been associated with the isolation of Jews into particular segments of European cities. In a broader social context, ghetto functions within popular consciousness to signify the "quarter where members of a minority reside as a result of social or economic pressure." Since the late 1960s ghetto has come to be associated largely with the concentration of African Americans in urban areas. Within Duke's popular culture, ghetto has assumed a broader meaning. How is it that a shirt could be ghetto? Is it a shirt that comes from a housing authority or a shirt that depicts the projects? Here ghetto refers to a shirt that the speaker thought was ugly or unattractive. How do you act ghetto? Here acting ghetto signified listening to or singing rap songs.

The BET quote is most illustrative in helping us define and seek greater understanding of ghetto as it's used at Duke. BET is a network that presents music videos (mostly R&B, jazz, gospel and hip hop) and other programming. What links these programs to their network is the term black. Thus, this quote "BET is ghetto" correlates blackness and ghetto.

This stereotype of blackness refers to media depictions that suggest most people who live in the ghetto are black and come from lower-income neighborhoods. According to these stereotypes, ghetto is anything pertaining to hip hop culture, colloquially referred to by the dominant culture as rap. Thus, clothing lines and particular clothing items popular within the hip hop culture are labeled as ghetto. Stereotyped and simplistic understandings of hip hop culture lead people to assume that actions of some people, such as illegal activities, smoking weed, drinking 40s, walking a particular way, or using colloquial terms considered outside the official English language means ghetto.

What strikes me as particularly offensive in some Duke students' use of the word, is the assumption that ghetto implies a negative connotation. However, many individuals from the ghetto utilize the word to positively glorify their ability to achieve, in spite of social and economic stigmas associated with their neighborhoods. Percy Miller (Master P) uses the term to show a remembrance and pride for the community that nurtured him.

Articulations of ghetto assume a different nature when blurred along racial lines. Having ghetto attributes becomes not only those from the ghetto or engaged in ghetto activities, but all people with any attribute common to or behavior associated with blackness. One conception of blackness pollutes other conceptions, so that the stereotype of the ghetto male or female becomes the same stereotypes as black male or female. So, a ghetto booty, means you have booty like, according to a stereotypical prototype of the black female body, a black girl. What's so wrong with a big booty? The logic then is: ghetto = rap music = hip hop culture = black = lower class = criminal = big booty. The logic may seem faulty but that's the nature of common sense, stereotypes and ill informed opinions about groups of individuals.

For many Duke students, Central Campus has become Duke's ghetto. Central Campus is considered in dire need of renovation. Within Duke's popular, majority culture Central Campus is like the projects because its buildings are so run down. For some, it is considered dangerous to step foot on Central Campus after dark and an adventure to ride the Central Campus bus after 6. Yet, as one of Duke's three campuses, owned, funded, and maintained by Duke University funds, Central Campus is far from a housing authority funded with public monies for lower income people. People who live in Central Campus apartments are Duke students who pay the same tuition as those who inhabit West and East campuses. Beyond the rhetoric, it is my sense that what lies at the heart of this conceptualization of Central Campus as the ghetto and the loose use of the word ghetto around campus, is the word's ideological relation in the dominant common sense to stereotypes of blackness. There is an implied relation between black persons and ghetto. Thus, the fact that a large portion of black students live on Central may begin to show why for so many, Central Campus is "like so ghetto."

The point is not just to highlight irrational articulations of ghetto, but show what the particular statements with the word reveal about race relations at Duke. Duke students' colloquial use of ghetto communicates not only an implicit acceptance of classist assumptions and stereotypes of blackness as social facts, but it also speaks to a power differential between the speaker and those branded as ghetto. So now only one question remains, when you use the term ghetto, what are you saying?