ABSTRACT
Everyone sees them. They are a part of virtually every large and midsize urban community in America. Yet, as Ralph Ellison so eloquently wrote two generations ago in Invisible Man, “I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me.” Today, throughout the United States, many people refuse to see the young African American men who hang out on street corners; most of us are busy working, running errands, doing chores, and raising families.
