ABSTRACT
Based on our critical ethnographic research with New York’s Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation (from 1996–2001) in direct contrast to received wisdom at the time, we observed socially labeled deviants: (i) engage in endlessly ingenious ways to plumb their ethnicity, transforming themselves into culturally competent social agents; (ii) launch a frontal attack on cynicism and fatalism over time, as part of an effort to change members’ self-perception and convince themselves of their unfulfilled and potential agency; (iii) embrace unabashedly their spirituality through reacquainting themselves with their own religio-political biographies; and (iv) experience a collective “we-ness” that inspires individuals to transcend the semblance of their material limitations by reviewing and renewing their commitment to a new morality.
