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Real Great Society

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Real Great Society (RGS) was a Puerto Rican youth collective created by activists Angelo Gonzalez and Carlos ‘Chino’ García on New York City's Lower East Side in 1964.[1] Its name was a reference to then-President Lyndon B Johnson’s Great Society. Its goal was to help residents of the poverty-stricken neighborhoods of New York City attain bottom-up self-sufficiency.[2] In June 1967, RGS members created the University of the Streets, which one member described as an organization that would have "young people from the neighborhood develop a curriculum which is relevant to them, their lives, their experience."[3] The school, housed in a building on the corner of Seventh Street and Avenue A, lasted for over 30 years.[4] Chino Garcia and several other members of the Real Great Society went on to form CHARAS/El Bohio, considered a successor organization to RGS in 1979.[5]

References

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  1. ^ Schrader, Timo (2018). "Education as a Human Right: The Real Great Society and a Pedagogy of Activism". Journal for the Study of Radicalism. 12 (1): 123–157 – via jstor.
  2. ^ Bagchee, Nandini (2018). Counter Institution: Activist Estates of the Lower East Side. Fordham University Press. ISBN 9780823279265.
  3. ^ Kihss, Peter (February 27, 1968). "Ex-Gang Leaders Obtain U.S. Funds". New York Times. Retrieved February 7, 2020.
  4. ^ Resistance : a radical political and social history of the Lower East Side. Clayton Patterson, Joe Flood, Alan Moore (Seven stories press 1st ed.). New York: Seven Stories Press. 2007. pp. 23–25. ISBN 978-1-58322-745-9. OCLC 76794738.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  5. ^ Resistance : a radical political and social history of the Lower East Side. Clayton Patterson, Joe Flood, Alan Moore (Seven stories press 1st ed.). New York: Seven Stories Press. 2007. pp. 21–36. ISBN 978-1-58322-745-9. OCLC 76794738.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)

Further reading

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