Sudhir Venkatesh

Last updated

Sudhir Venkatesh
SudhirVenkatesh01.JPG
Venkatesh in September 2013
Born
Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh

1966 (age 5758)
Education University of California, San Diego (BA)
University of Chicago (PhD)
Known forUrban ethnography
Scientific career
Fields Sociology, social economics
Institutions Columbia University; Facebook
Thesis American project: a historical-ethnography of Chicago's Robert Taylor Homes
Academic advisors William Julius Wilson

Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh (born 1966) is an American sociologist and urban ethnographer. He is William B. Ransford Professor of Sociology & African-American Studies at Columbia University, a position he has held since 1999. In his work, Venkatesh has studied gangs and underground economies, public housing, advertising and technology. [1] As of 2018, he is the Director of Signal: The Tech & Society Lab at Columbia University. [2]

Contents

Venkatesh is the author of the book, Gang Leader for a Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes To The Streets, published by Penguin Press in 2008. [1] Venkatesh is also the host of Sudhir Breaks the Internet, a podcast published by Freakonomics Radio Network. [3] Additionally, Venkatesh is a public writer and documentary filmmaker, and has held positions at Facebook and Twitter.

Early life and education

Born in Madras, now Chennai, and raised in Irvine, California, Venkatesh received a B.A. in mathematics from the University of California, San Diego in 1988. [4] Venkatesh describes his switch from mathematics to sociology in graduate school as a result of conducting ethnographic fieldwork in Chicago's inner-city neighborhoods. [5] In 1997, he earned a Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Chicago, where he studied under Professor William Julius Wilson, focusing on the Robert Taylor Homes, a housing project in Chicago.

Freakonomics Radio Network

In September 2011, Venkatesh was featured on Freakonomics Radio episode 42, "The Upside of Quitting." [6] Venkatesh was also a Freakonomics blog contributor in 2008, authoring a nine-part blog series titled, "What Do Real Thugs Think of The Wire", in which he reported on the experience of watching episodes of popular crime drama television series The Wire with gang members he knew through his research. [7] In 2021, he began hosting the podcast Sudhir Breaks the Internet, which focuses on the tech industry, particularly social media companies.

Academic career

Venkatesh is William B. Ransford Professor of Sociology & African-American Studies at Columbia University, a position he has held continuously since 1999. He was awarded the National Science Foundation NSF CAREER award in 2000. From 1996 to 1999, Venkatesh was elected as a Junior Fellow in the Society of Fellows at Harvard University. [1]

Advertising and technology

Since 2013, Venkatesh has been writing about the advertising industry, both in academic journals and the popular press. His current research examines the strategies platforms use to handle negative behavior. [8] Venkatesh served as the Academic Director of the Berlin School of Creative Leadership, a global Executive MBA program for the advertising industry, from 2011 to 2012. [9] As of 2018, Venkatesh is also currently a Co-Director of the Social Media Governance Initiative, a joint effort between the SIGNAL Lab at Columbia University and Yale University's Justice Collaboratory with the goal of ensuring that digital technologies foster healthy online interaction. [2]

Fast Company, an American business magazine, has published four articles by Venkatesh on the topics of advertising and technology: "Thinking Small: 3 Ways To Remain Creative In A World Of Big Data", "Can Advertising Bring Back The Rust Belt?", "How To Use Conflict To Unlock Creativity", and "The Science Of Awards: Your Data-Driven Guide To Winning At Cannes". [10]   [11] [12] [13]

Public housing

After earning his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Chicago in 1997, Venkatesh went on to write an award-winning book, American Project: The Rise and Fall of a Modern Ghetto, published by Harvard University Press in 2000. Based on nearly a decade of doctoral fieldwork in Chicago's Robert Taylor Homes, American Project "seeks to reexamine public housing from the inside out, and to salvage its troubled legacy." [14]

The following year, Venkatesh co-authored a study on public housing with Steven D. Levitt, titled "Growing Up in the Projects: The Economic Lives of a Cohort of Men who Came of Age in Chicago Public Housing", which was published in the American Economic Review. [15]

Gangs and underground economies

In 2008 Venkatesh authored a book titled, Gang Leader for a Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes To The Streets. The book chronicles the life of urban poor in Chicago, particularly the Robert Taylor Homes and the gang, the Black Kings, whose leader J.T. he befriended (J.T. was renamed in the book for anonymity). He found that most foot soldiers in drug gangs make only $3.30 an hour. The year it came out, Gang Leader for a Day was awarded Best Book awards from The Economist and Slate.com. In 2015, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg selected the book for his "A Year of Books" book club. [16] In 2017, it was reported that AMC Networks would be developing a drama series adaptation from the book. [17]

Two years prior, Venkatesh authored another book about illegal economies in Chicago, titled Off the Books: The Underground Economy of the Urban Poor. Published by Harvard University Press in 2006, Off the Books received a Best Book Award from Slate.com in 2006, as well as the C. Wright Mills Award in 2006. [18]

In a separate research project with Steven Levitt, Venkatesh hired former sex workers to track working street prostitutes in Chicago, finding that they make about $30 to $35 an hour, with those working with pimps making more and suffering fewer arrests. A street prostitute was arrested about once per 450 sexual encounters ("tricks"). Condoms were used in only 20% of the contacts. [19] Together, Venkatesh and Levitt co-authored two articles in 2000, "'Are We a Family or a Business?' History and Disjuncture in the Urban American Street Gang" and "The Financial Activities of an Urban Street Gang." [20] [21]

Venkatesh's 2022 book, The Tomorrow Game: Rival Teenagers, Their Race for a Gun, and a Community United to Save Them, focuses on families surviving poverty and gun violence in a Southside Chicago community [22]

Academic and research administration

Venkatesh served as director of the MA in Global Thought for Columbia University's Committee on Global Thought from 2015 to 2016. For three years from 2009-2012, he was a Senior Research Advisor for the Department of Justice. At the same time, from 2011 to 2012, Venkatesh served as Academic Director for the Berlin School of Creative Leadership. [9]

In 2009 Venkatesh became director of Columbia University's Institute for Social and Economic Research and Policy, or ISERP. In 2011 Venkatesh was the subject of an investigation on inappropriate spending and misappropriation of funds at ISERP. In 2012 Venkatesh revealed to The New York Times that he had reimbursed Columbia University for approximately $13,000 of $240,000 of funds that were misallocated during his tenure as director of ISERP. [23]

Before becoming director of ISERP, Venkatesh served as director of the Center for Urban Research & Policy at Columbia University from 2004 to 2008. Additionally, he served as Director of Ethnography & Principal Investigator of the Multi-City Gun Project from 2018 to 2020. [9]

Work with social media companies

Venkatesh was hired in 2016 to help Facebook deal with bullying and misinformation and was let go from the company in 2018. [3] In late 2018, Venkatesh started advising Twitter as Director of Social Science Research and Health Research. [1]

Public writing and documentaries

Venkatesh's editorial writings have appeared in The New York Times , the Chicago Tribune , and the The Washington Post . He writes for Slate.com, and his stories have appeared in This American Life , Wired, and on National Public Radio. [24]

Venkatesh's first two documentary projects relate to his research in public housing. He directed and produced Transformation: A History of Public Housing, a three-part documentary series that aired on PBS in 2003 and was awarded the Best Documentary Series Award by the Associated Press. His first documentary film, Dislocation, which aired on PBS in 2005, followed families as they relocated from condemned public housing developments. [18] His most recent documentary film project, titled At the Top of My Voice, follows a scholar and artist who return to the ex-Soviet republic of Georgia to promote democracy and safeguard human rights. [9]

Selected works

Books

He has also contributed to Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner's Freakonomics in a chapter entitled, "Why Do Drug Dealers Still Live With Their Moms?"

Documentaries

Venkatesh at a New York book signing SudhirVenkatesh02.JPG
Venkatesh at a New York book signing

Public writings

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Street prostitution</span> Soliciting prostitution from a public place

Street prostitution is a form of prostitution in which a prostitute solicits customers from a public place, most commonly a street, while waiting at street corners or walking alongside a street, but also other public places such as parks, benches, etc. The street prostitute is often dressed in a provocative manner. The sex act may be performed in the customer's car, in a nearby secluded street location, or at the prostitute's residence or in a rented motel room.

William Julius Wilson is an American sociologist, a professor at Harvard University, and an author of works on urban sociology, race, and class issues. Laureate of the National Medal of Science, he served as the 80th President of the American Sociological Association, was a member of numerous national boards and commissions. He identified the importance of neighborhood effects and demonstrated how limited employment opportunities and weakened institutional resources exacerbated poverty within American inner-city neighborhoods.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Taylor Homes</span> Former public housing development in Chicago, Illinois, United States

Robert Taylor Homes was a public housing project in the Bronzeville neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, Illinois from 1962 to 2007. The largest housing project in the United States, it consisted of 28 virtually identical high-rises, set out in a linear plan for two miles, with the high-rises regularly configured in a horseshoe shape of three in each block. It was located along State Street between Pershing Road and 54th Street, east of the Dan Ryan Expressway. The project was named for Robert Rochon Taylor (1899–1957), an African-American activist and the first African American chairman of the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA). It was a part of the State Street Corridor which included other CHA housing projects: Stateway Gardens, Dearborn Homes, Harold Ickes Homes, and Hilliard Homes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Foote Whyte</span> American sociologist (1914–2000)

William Foote Whyte was an American sociologist chiefly known for his ethnographic study in urban sociology, Street Corner Society. A pioneer in participant observation, he lived for four years in an Italian community in Boston while a Junior Fellow at Harvard researching social relations of street gangs in Boston's North End.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steven Levitt</span> American economist

Steven David Levitt is an American economist and co-author of the best-selling book Freakonomics and its sequels. Levitt was the winner of the 2003 John Bates Clark Medal for his work in the field of crime, and is currently the William B. Ogden Distinguished Service Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago as well as the Faculty Director and Co-Founder of the Center for Radical Innovation for Social Change at the University of Chicago which incubates the Data Science for Everyone coalition. He was co-editor of the Journal of Political Economy published by the University of Chicago Press until December 2007. In 2009, Levitt co-founded TGG Group, a business and philanthropy consulting company. He was chosen as one of Time magazine's "100 People Who Shape Our World" in 2006. A 2011 survey of economics professors named Levitt their fourth favorite living economist under the age of 60, after Paul Krugman, Greg Mankiw and Daron Acemoglu.

<i>Freakonomics</i> 2005 nonfiction book by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything is the debut non-fiction book by University of Chicago economist Steven Levitt and New York Times journalist Stephen J. Dubner. Published on April 12, 2005, by William Morrow, the book has been described as melding pop culture with economics. By late 2009, the book had sold over 4 million copies worldwide. Based on the success of the original book, Levitt and Dubner have grown the Freakonomics brand into a multi-media franchise, with a sequel book, a feature film, a regular radio segment on National Public Radio, and a weekly blog.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stephen J. Dubner</span> American author, journalist, and podcast host

Stephen Joseph Dubner is an American author, journalist, and podcast and radio host. He is co-author of the popular Freakonomics book series: Freakonomics, SuperFreakonomics, Think Like a Freak and When to Rob a Bank. He is the host of Freakonomics Radio.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Crack epidemic in the United States</span> Drug epidemic in the 1980s and 1990s

The crack epidemic was a surge of crack cocaine use in major cities across the United States throughout the entirety of the 1980s and the early 1990s. This resulted in a number of social consequences, such as increasing crime and violence in American inner city neighborhoods, a resulting backlash in the form of tough on crime policies, a massive spike in incarceration rates, and a sharp escalation of the war on drugs.

Herbert J. Gans is a German-born American sociologist who taught at Columbia University from 1971 to 2007.

The Institute for Social and Economic Research and Policy (ISERP) is the research arm of the social sciences at Columbia University, formerly known as the Paul F. Lazarsfeld Center for the Social Sciences. ISERP works to produce pioneering social science research and to shape public policy by integrating knowledge and methods across the social scientific disciplines. ISERP organizes an active intellectual community at Columbia University through its Faculty Fellows program, research centers, projects, and training initiatives.

Elijah Anderson is an American sociologist. He is the Sterling Professor of Sociology and of African American Studies at Yale University, where he teaches and directs the Urban Ethnography Project. Anderson is one of the nation’s leading urban ethnographers and cultural theorists. Anderson is known most notably for his book, Code of the Street: Decency, Violence, and the Moral Life of the Inner City (1999).

Beauty B. Turner was an American housing activist and journalist from Chicago, Illinois. At the time of her death, Turner was compared to the civil rights leader Ida B. Wells.

Venkatesh is a given name and family name from the Indian subcontinent derived from Venkateswara, a Hindu deity. Notable persons with the name include:

<i>SuperFreakonomics</i> 2009 book by Steven Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance is the second non-fiction book by University of Chicago economist Steven Levitt and The New York Times journalist Stephen J. Dubner, released in early October 2009 in Europe and on October 20, 2009 in the United States. It is a sequel to Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything.

Sudhir is an Indian masculine given name. The Sanskrit word sudhīra means "very wise", "resolute".

<i>Freakonomics</i> (film) 2010 American film

Freakonomics: The Movie is a 2010 American documentary film based on the 2005 book Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by economist Steven D. Levitt and writer Stephen J. Dubner. The film premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in April 2010 and had a theatrical release later that year. On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 66% based on reviews from 64 critics.

<i>Freakonomics Radio</i> American public radio program

Freakonomics Radio is an American public radio program and podcast network which discusses socioeconomic issues for a general audience. While the network, as of 2023, includes five programs, the primary podcast is also named Freakonomics and is a spin-off of the 2005 book Freakonomics. Journalist Stephen Dubner hosts the show, with economist Steven Levitt as a regular guest, both of whom co-wrote the book of the same name. The show is primarily distributed as a podcast, and is among the most popular on iTunes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter H. Rossi</span> American sociologist (1921–2006)

Peter Henry Rossi was a prominent sociologist best known for his research on the origin of homelessness, and documenting the changing face of American homelessness in the 1980s. Rossi was also known for his work devising ways to evaluate federally funded initiatives in education, health services, crime control, and housing. He influentially applied his sociological expertise to affect related policy-making and funding agencies. At his death, he was the Stuart A. Rice professor emeritus of Sociology and the director emeritus of the Social and Demographic Research Institute (SADRI) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Patrick Sharkey</span> American sociologist and criminologist (born c. 1977)

Patrick Sharkey is an American urban sociologist and criminologist. He has been Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs at Princeton University since 2019. He was formerly Professor and Chair of the Department of Sociology at New York University, with an affiliation at NYU's Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service.

<i>Gang Leader for a Day</i> Book by Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh

Gang Leader for a Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes to the Streets is a memoir written by Sudhir Venkatesh. The book chronicles the life of the urban poor and explores Venkatesh's views on poverty, money, gangs, drugs, and life in Chicago. In 2017, it was reported that AMC Networks would be developing a drama series adapted from the book.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "Sudhir A. Venkatesh - Department of Sociology".
  2. 1 2 "SIGNAL: The Tech & Society Lab @ Columbia University".
  3. 1 2 "Sudhir Breaks the Internet - Freakonomics Freakonomics".
  4. Archived 17 April 2011 at the Wayback Machine
  5. Venkatesh, Sudhir (2008). Gang leader for a day: a rogue sociologist takes to the streets. New York: Penguin Press.
  6. "The Upside of Quitting (Ep. 42) - Freakonomics Freakonomics".
  7. "The Wire Archives - Freakonomics Freakonomics".
  8. Tyler, Tom; Katsaros, Matt; Meares, Tracey; Venkatesh, Sudhir (2021). "Social media governance: can social media companies motivate voluntary rule following behavior among their users?". Journal of Experimental Criminology. 17: 109–127. doi:10.1007/s11292-019-09392-z. S2CID   214473041.
  9. 1 2 3 4 "Sudhir Venkatesh - ISERP".
  10. "Thinking Small: 3 Ways To Remain Creative In A World Of Big Data". 16 June 2015.
  11. "Can Advertising Bring Back The Rust Belt?". 4 September 2013.
  12. "How To Use Conflict To Unlock Creativity". 15 June 2015.
  13. "The Science Of Awards: Your Data-Driven Guide To Winning At Cannes". 3 May 2013.
  14. "American Project—Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh - Harvard University Press".
  15. Levitt, Steven D.; Venkatesh, Sudhir Alladi (May 2001). "Growing Up in the Projects: The Economic Lives of a Cohort of Men Who Came of Age in Chicago Public Housing". American Economic Review. 91 (2): 79–84. doi:10.1257/aer.91.2.79.
  16. "Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg Book Club Gang Leader For A Day". Business Insider .
  17. "Edward Burns & Radar Developing 'The Line Between' Thriller Novel For Television". 22 January 2019.
  18. 1 2 "venkatesh_sudhirCV".
  19. "In the Windy City, prostitutes sleep with police more often than get arrested by them". 7 January 2008.
  20. Levitt, Steven D.; Venkatesh, Sudhir Alladi (August 2000). ""Are We a Family or a Business?" History and Disjuncture in the Urban American Street Gang". Theory and Society. 29 (4): 427–462. doi:10.1023/A:1007151703198. S2CID   142561847.
  21. Levitt, Steven D.; Venkatesh, Sudhir Alladi (August 2000). "An Economic Analysis of a Drug-Selling Gang's Finances" (PDF). The Quarterly Journal of Economics. 115 (3): 755–789. doi:10.1162/003355300554908. S2CID   7154474.
  22. Venkatesh, Sudhir (28 June 2022). The Tomorrow Game. Simon and Schuster. ISBN   9781501194399.
  23. "Columbia's Gang Scholar Lives on the Edge". The New York Times. 30 November 2012.
  24. "- AC3 Link - Columbia University".