Paying it forward: Black men mentoring in a predominately Latina/o community

Much of the literature on mentoring in disadvantaged communities focuses on the black middle class's ability to mentor and role model for the black poor (Anderson 1999; DuBois [1899] 1967; Wilson 1987). William Julius Wilson (1987) noted that as middle-class blacks began to achieve, they moved from their previous African-American neighborhoods to the suburbs, leaving an impoverished underclass. Elijah Anderson (1999) describes "old heads" as mostly men who lived in low-income, African-American communities and had been able to obtain some economic markers of success who mentor young people. Anderson goes on to discuss how continued economic disenfranchisement has led to fewer "old heads" in the community. This dissertation examines the roles of African-American male coaches at a predominantly Latino recreation center in Los Angeles who take on the same role as Elijah Anderson's "old heads." The difference with these "old heads" is that, for them, community and the youth they mentor are not necessarily located where they live, but are at the recreation center where they congregate. Unlike much of the aforementioned work, these mentors or "Community Heads," were raised as part of the working class or black poor and have limited educations. This study uses participant observation and interviews to examine a unique community site where new forms of cross-cultural mentorship occur and to challenge traditional top down approaches to studies of mentorship.