ABSTRACT
Graffi ti writing is as ancient as human communication (Reisner, 1971), but in the United States it gained widespread attention only with its proliferation in urban neighborhoods in the late 1960s and 1970s. Most Americans associate this graffi ti explosion with urban gangs, regarding its markings and murals as visible, invasive challenges to middle-class and elite property, sense of security, and aesthetics. Although gangs have produced a portion of urban graffi ti during the last four decades, most is more accurately linked to hip hop, a mix of cultural practices that appeared in the neighborhoods of New York and other U.S. cities during the mid-1970s (Ferrell, 1993). Anthropologist Susan Phillips (1999) argues that hip hop graffi ti is actually an alternative to gangs, with “writers” organizing themselves in crews that spar with each other “through style and production as opposed to violence” (p. 313). Over the years, graffi ti crews have focused urban adolescents on putting their art up around the city, inventing new styles, and organizing nocturnal visits to the subway yards, experiences that, although oft en illicit, are far less destructive than most gang activities (Stewart, 1989). Th e writer expression “graffi ti saved my life” is no exaggeration; without it, many more urban kids would have become entangled in violence and crime (M. Gonzalez, Jr., personal communication, March 17, 2002; Wimsatt, 2000).
