Snitches end up in ditches

“Snitches End Up in Ditches” and Other Cautionary Tales*

Edward W. Morris University of Kentucky

Department of Sociology Patterson Office Tower 1569 Lexington, KY 40506-0027

ewmo222@uky.edu

* This research was supported by a grant from the Spencer Foundation. I thank the staff and students at Clayton and Woodrow Wilson High Schools for sharing their time and thoughts with me. I thank Joseph De Angelis, Aaron Kupchik for helpful comments on previous drafts. The views expressed here are solely those of the author.

“Snitches End Up in Ditches” and Other Cautionary Tales

ABSTRACT

This paper examines the “stop snitching” phenomenon in relation to teenagers and schooling. It

shows evidence of a code against sharing information with formal authorities among students at

two low income schools: a predominately black, urban school and a predominately white, rural

school. Using Bourdieu’s concept of habitus, the analysis demonstrates how anti-snitching is

woven into the social fabric of these communities, prompting student ambivalence toward

school-sanctioned methods of conflict resolution. The findings highlight the broad reach of the

anti-snitching phenomenon, situating this mentality as the result of community-based distrust of

formal authority. The paper assesses implications of anti-snitching for school discipline and

climate.

Keywords: School discipline; Criminalization; Urban education; Rural education; Habitus

“Snitches End Up in Ditches” and Other Cautionary Tales

A mantra of “stop snitching” has become popular in various communities throughout the

country. This motto – famously trumpeted by several hip hop artists – appears on t-shirts, in

song lyrics, and in films. It discourages revealing information to authorities that could directly

lead to a conviction, such as witnesses who are offered reduced sentences in exchange for

providing evidence against their criminal associates. Recently, evidence suggests that “stop

snitching” has broadened into a more general “street code” (Anderson 1999; Rosenfeld, Jacobs,

and Wright 2003) which castigates any cooperation with police or other authorities. Some might

adhere to the “no snitching” precept from simple fear of retaliation, and some might genuinely

believe that cooperating with police creates more harm than good. Regardless, the newest

incarnation of this longstanding ethos among criminals has trickled out into larger segments of

society, including otherwise law-abiding people (Kahn 2007).

In this paper, I examine the “stop snitching” phenomenon in relation to teenagers and

schooling. Based on a comparative ethnography of two low-income high schools, I find

evidence of anti-snitching principles among students. My findings build on previous research in

several ways. First, my findings demonstrate the burgeoning purview of anti-snitching. I locate

an anti-snitching mentality among high school students who were not career criminals, and even

among well-behaved, school-attached students. In addition, the comparative design of my

ethnography examines a predominately black, urban school and a predominately white, rural

school. Surprisingly, I found evidence of a stop snitching code among students at both schools.

This research also extends existing literature by connecting anti-snitching to research on school

disengagement. Previous work has understood “stop snitching” primarily from the perspective

of criminological theories, but linking it to education-focused theories can enhance our

understanding of snitching within the context of schools. Specifically, I employ Bourdieu’s

concept of habitus to understand how anti-snitching becomes woven into the social fabric of

some communities, prompting student ambivalence toward school-sanctioned methods of

conflict resolution.

BACKGROUND

There is limited but informative research on the “stop snitching” phenomenon. Most research on

anti-snitching stems from samples of active criminal offenders. Rosenfeld, Jacobs, and Wright

(2003) interviewed street offenders, asking about their perceptions of the police and police

informants. Their results revealed strong antipathy for police. Interviewees recounted stories of

police bias, invasive surveillance, and brutality. In logical extension, these interviewees reported

acute distrust of police, and no desire to aid law enforcement. Even if interviewees stated that

they themselves were victimized, they still disavowed seeking police help. These offenders thus

adhered to a “code of the street” (Anderson 1999) in which “respect, security, and status come

only to those with the proven ability to take care of their own business” (Rosenfeld et al. 2003:

298). These offenders emphasized resolving their own conflicts, without interference from

external sources of authority.

Anti-snitching thus suggests an alternative set of group norms. Topalli (2005) explores

the normative implications of snitching further, demonstrating an inversion of norms among

street offenders, in which being “good” is interpreted negatively. The interviewees in Topalli’s

(2005) study reported that it is wrong to “snitch,” or tell the police any information about crime,

even if that crime could involve injury or death. This code of anti-snitching was so ingrained,

respondents appeared to feel guilty if they had worked with the police at all, and contrived

justifications for their cooperation to assuage this guilt (Topalli 2005; see also Rosenfeld et al.

2003). Thus, based on the small but informative literature on anti-snitching, this phenomenon

appears to be an outgrowth of a street code among criminals that inverts conventional social

norms. As Topalli (2005: 810-811) states, “where middle-class people would be chastised or

sanctioned for failing to contact the police in response to witnessed criminal activity, those who

inhabit the urban landscape (specifically hardcore offenders) are sanctioned for the opposite.”

But many questions remain about the code of anti-snitching. While groundbreaking, the

studies discussed above rely on urban and African American samples of street offenders. How

do people not involved in criminal activity, but residing in low-income urban areas, view

“snitching”? Anti-snitching has also been couched primarily in the African American

community, interpreted as something emerging from the historical distrust of the criminal justice

system (Kahn 2007; Pitts 2009). But what is the perception of this code from people of other

racial/ethnic groups, especially those living in low-income communities? Is anti-snitching a

“black thing” or does it result more precisely from conditions of economic deprivation and

perceptions of inequality? “Stop snitching” has also been interpreted as message that can

influence youth, particularly because of its promotion among popular hip hop artists. However,

studies of this phenomenon have focused on adults and their interactions with criminal justice

authorities. How might snitching be interpreted by youths, and how might this influence their

interactions within schools?

Through this final question, I intend to merge criminological and educational areas of

study concerning this problem. As I find, “stop snitching” has implications not only for criminal

justice, but for more common enactments of school discipline. Further, educational literature can

provide a different angle on anti-snitching, framing it as indicative of a distinct “habitus”

(Bourdieu 1977) in which handling one’s own problems takes strategic precedent over seeking

external means of enforcement. In criminological terms, this is closer to a “value attenuation”

model in which distrust of law enforcement stems primarily from interpretations that it is unfair,

rather than an entirely separate, subcultural value system (Carr, Napolitano, and Keating 2007).

Students in my study employed practices under a context of institutional skepticism, which

extended to school authorities. The students encouraged standing up for oneself and resolving

conflicts independently, and discouraged telling school authorities about altercations. To

understand this further, I turn to Bourdieu’s explanations for school disconnection.

Stop Snitching and Habitus

The theoretical framework of Pierre Bourdieu (Bourdieu 1977; 1990; Bourdieu and Passeron

1977; Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992) has been influential in the sociology of education. Habitus

is one of the more oblique and controversial of Bourdieu’s concepts. It is most directly defined

as “a system of…dispositions which, integrating past experiences, functions…as a matrix of

perceptions, appreciations, and actions” (Bourdieu 1977:82-83). Bourdieu modified the concept

throughout his career. He employed habitus as a connection between external social structures

and the internal guiding principles of individuals – a mechanism through which people

internalize structured experiences and subsequently develop strategies for future action which

reproduce and modify objective social structures. Although habitus frames strategies for action,

it operates “below the level of calculation and even consciousness” (Bourdieu and Wacquant

1992). Thus, habitus, as the name implies, consists of habitual inclinations for action,

internalized by individuals without overt deliberation. It consists of what feels “natural,”

“correct,” and “commonsensical” to people. It is more mutable and logical than a “value

system” because people – individually and in groups – develop a distinctive habitus based on

perceptions of material conditions, and this may be altered through continuing experience and

interpretation (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992). People develop unique dispositions and creative

strategies for action depending on the particular social conditions and experiences they

encounter.

Applying the concept of habitus to anti-snitching, such an ethos might stem from distrust

for external authority based on a collective or individual history of negative experiences. Youths

socialized within communities where institutions such as the police or the school are perceived

as historically unfair may develop skepticism of these institutions. Further, the harsh

environments of disadvantaged communities necessitate demonstrating toughness and handling

situations without the aid of external authority (Anderson 1999). These historical and structural

conditions combine to forge a habitus which discourages blithe cooperation with external

authorities. This is not the same as adopting an alternative value system in which criminal

behavior or school opposition is valorized. Anti-snitching, from this perspective, is not the

frightening outgrowth of a subversive street code. Instead, it simply reflects a practical

disposition against earnestly trusting and utilizing institutionalized authority. It does not imply

absolute, abstract opposition, but rather a situated “logic of practice” deploying strategic

resistance to particular enactments of authoritative power (Bourdieu 1990) [1]. As Bourdieu

states, “people are not fools; they are much less bizarre or deluded than we would spontaneously

believe precisely because they have internalized, through a protracted and multi-sided process of

conditioning, the chances they face” (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992: 130). As I will show, the

anti-snitching mantra does not necessarily indicate oppositional values, but reflects a habitus that

disposes certain youths to resolve disputes independently and view the intervention of

disciplinary organizations such as police and schools pessimistically.

METHODS

Data for this study come from a comparative ethnography of two high schools in Ohio. I

conducted fieldwork at these schools from January, 2006 until June, 2007. One of the schools

was an urban school that I call Woodrow Wilson High School (all personal and place names are

pseudonyms). At the beginning of my fieldwork, the student body of this school was 91 percent

African American, with 76 percent of its students classified as economically disadvantaged

based on free or reduced lunch status. The second school was a rural school that I call Clayton

High School. Clayton’s student body was 98 percent white and 54 percent economically

disadvantaged at the beginning of my fieldwork.

My fieldwork consisted primarily of observations and interviews. At both schools I

observed in classrooms, hallways, lunchrooms, after school events, and school related

ceremonies. I visited both schools from 1 to 4 days per week over the course of my research,

briefly recording observations in a small notebook. Upon leaving the field each day, I expanded

these “jottings” into more developed fieldnotes (Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw 1995). I recorded

notes as quickly as possible after observation, or in some cases during the progress of that

observation (such as within classrooms), to increase fidelity (Lofland et al. 2006). During the

process of fieldwork, I informally interviewed and conversed with numerous teachers and

administrators. Because of the small size of Clayton (less than 350 students), I was able to get to

know teachers and administrators there quickly. At Woodrow Wilson, a larger school of nearly

1,000 students, I focused on particular classrooms, where I got to know 10 teachers well through

regular contact. I formally interviewed 31 students – 15 from Clayton and 16 from Woodrow

Wilson. These interviews followed a semi-structured format and were audio-recorded. I used

the technique of purposive sampling to vary the sample according to gender and achievement

level within each school (Lofland et al. 2006). Sixteen of the interviewees identified as “male”

and 15 as “female.” Seventeen interviewees identified as “white” or “Caucasian” and 14 as

“black” or “African American.” The sample included students near the top and near the bottom

of their class rankings. All students were either sophomores or freshman in high school at the

time of the interview, and ranged in age from 14 to 17 years.

The comparative ethnography concentrated on intersections of race, class, and gender on

school engagement. However, as an ethnographer, I remained open to making new discoveries

in the field. This paper stems from one of these unexpected discoveries. As part of my interest

in gender and school engagement, I asked students questions about fighting and discipline, which

both have implications for enactments of gender as well as school detachment. In the process of

this questioning, I noticed in the initial, open coding of my data that several students at both

schools discussed “snitching,” although this was not a specified question. I then coded data in a

more “focused” manner for the subtheme of snitching, linking this to perceptions of discipline

and conflict resolution (see Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw 1995 for a discussion of open and focused

coding). I then grouped the results of this focused coding into themes relevant to snitching,

which form the basis for the analysis below.

FINDINGS

“You Haveta Get Respect”

My interviews initially revealed that physical fighting constituted an important method of

conflict resolution at both schools, especially for boys but to a lesser extent for girls (Morris

2008). I asked students if there was any acceptable way to avoid fights or other sorts of

confrontation. Most said that social pressure virtually required a person to physically fight if

challenged. Rather than describing this pressure as oppressive, however, students at both schools

underscored the utility of “standing up for yourself” and handling one’s own problems. This

mentality was part of the habitus that logically extended to anti-snitching principles.

A boy named Travis at Clayton described the severity of the environment and the

importance of gaining respect:

Travis: It’s worse [to try to avoid a fight]. At least if you get the crap beat out of you people are like “hey, at least you tried man, get ‘em back next time” or something like that, but if you try to get out of it you’re probably gonna get beat up anyway and get picked on. […] It’s actually kinda like a prison. Like if someone is like dissin’ you or somethin’ you haveta, you haveta like get respect…And if you get disrespected you gotta do something about it or…you get beat up or you get picked on or somethin’.

In comparing the code within the school to a prison, Travis emphasizes the importance of

achieving respect based on physical toughness and daring. This ethos was so strong at both

schools that students appeared bemused when I asked them if telling a teacher could be a viable

route to resolving a conflict. A boy named Roger at Clayton stated that someone who employed

school authority instead of fighting would get called a “pussy.” Roger told a story of a boy at the

school who was ridiculed for telling the principal and refusing to fight and after another boy stole

money from him. I asked Roger what he would do in a similar situation:

Edward Morris: Well like if someone steals money from you like that, what would you have done, would you have told the principal, or would you go to them and try to get the money back?

Roger: That – if they stole 150 bucks off me – I’d go straight to ‘em and kicked their ass pretty good. If they didn’t give it back to me, I’d beat it outta them.

This interest in personal conflict resolution reflects what Bourdieu refers to as group or

“class” habitus (Bourdieu 1977). Students discussed a general, taken-for-granted sentiment in

their milieu that emphasized particular actions regarding conflict resolution. At both schools,

this sentiment encouraged individuals to address disputes on their own, without the aid of

institutionalized social control. For many students – especially boys, but some girls – this

habitus encouraged using physical violence to protect oneself and others. Physical confrontation

allowed someone to avoid being seen as a “pushover” and gain “respect.” Students did not relate

such sentiments to following a broader, overt anti-school and anti-authority street code. Many

(including Courtney quoted above) invested considerable energy in school and emphasized the

importance of academics. Instead, such sentiments better represent a general, inculcated habitus

– “schemes of thought and expression” – that stressed certain strategies of action based on

certain objective conditions (Bourdieu 1977: 79). These schemes of thought operated “without

any intentional calculation or reference to a norm” (Bourdieu 1977: 80). Thus, students

described fighting and standing up for oneself as important, useful strategies of action, and did

not necessarily interpret these strategies as delinquent or oppositional.

Context: Distrust of Authority

Bourdieu (1977: 80) emphasized that group habitus stems from sharing similar circumstances

and experiences, or what he called the “homogeneity of the conditions of existence.” Students at

both schools shared present and historical conditions under which external sources of authority

were regarded with suspicion rather than blind faith. Such conditions formed a logical

foundation for the development of a habitus that emphasized empowerment and protection

through personal actions rather than through institutions of authority. This perception of

authority differed somewhat at each school. At Woodrow Wilson, a predominately African

American school, perceptions of racial discrimination appeared to play a prominent role in the

cynicism of authority (see also Anderson 1999; Hagan, Shedd, and Payne 2005). At Clayton, a

rural school, this cynicism stemmed from the stigma associated with family reputation (Batteau

1982; Duncan 1999).

Race-based Distrust

Race-based distrust of authority has been emphasized in much of the research and popular

discussion of anti-snitching. For example, in an article about the anti-snitching code, the

newspaper columnist Leonard Pitts (2009: D2) writes: “Yes, some of us [African Americans]

have a well-founded and deep seated distrust of the criminal justice system.” I saw evidence of

this skepticism from many students at Woodrow Wilson. For example, “stop snitching” shirts

were prohibited at the school, but I observed students wearing other shirts that suggested an anti-

criminal justice stance, such as one that read “if you see da police…warn a brotha.” Such

suspicion appeared even more overtly on posters that U.S. history students had made about their

perceptions of America. To be sure, these posters overwhelmingly contained positive statements

and imagery. However, the sanguine statements were tempered with cynical ones, such as

“America would be a better place without racism,” and “the justice system in this country

sucks.”

This pessimistic stance towards the criminal justice system is well documented in

predominately African American communities, especially in inner cities. This has led many to

presume that the anti-snitching mentality is an African American phenomenon. The comparative

design of my ethnography, however, revealed that “stop snitching” is not just present in urban,

African American communities. I found evidence of the same mantra at the predominately

white, rural school in my research. This demonstrates that anti-snitching is not simply a

subversive street code championed by gang-influenced African American rappers, as many

commentators have intimated (e.g. Kahn 2007; Pitts 2009). Instead, my research shows that anti-

snitching emerges from certain experiences and conditions of existence that have marginalized

people from institutions of authority. Some white rural students in my research shared similar

experiences and perceptions of authority to black urban students. These perceptions stemmed

primarily from family reputation in the community.

Reputation-based Distrust

Within urban areas, race creates salient dividing lines and inequalities, particularly apparent in

predominately minority “inner cities” and predominately white “suburbs” (Massey and Denton

1993; Bonilla-Silva and Embrick 2007). In the predominately white rural area of my research

such distinctly racialized urban divisions were less noticeable. A more conspicuous dividing line

in this community was family reputation, or “family name” as they called it at Clayton. As in

many rural areas, especially in Appalachia, the community was symbolically divided into “good

families” and “bad families” (Batteau 1982; Duncan 1999). This meant that some families

carried a “bad” stigma, interpreted as backwards, lazy, and deviant. Students at Clayton openly

discussed the importance of “family name.” Those who professed to have a “bad” family name

often perceived institutions such as the school and the local police to be unfairly biased against

them.

A student named Brent, for example, got in trouble frequently at school for fighting and

other forms of insubordination. I actually took him out of in-school suspension (where he spent

much of his school time) to interview him. In the interview, Brent described how the elite

families in the community looked down on him and his family. He suggested that this bias

against his family extended to the police: “Me and Clayton cops don’t get along (laughs). My

family has a bad reputation with them.” In school, he described fellow students from elite

families as the “preps” and stated that they “think they’re better than everyone else.” Brent

intimated that preps and their families held power over major community institutions such the

school and the police. He gave examples of how he had, in his estimation, been punished

unfairly in school: “Ever’ time the principal gets a hair up his ass he wants to call the cops on us.

And I can’t stand the cops. I do not get along with them. So…that’s not good.”

This distrust of the police and the perceived connection between police and school

administration encouraged Brent, like other students at both schools, to emphasize resolving his

own conflicts. As he stated: “The way I see it – if you can handle the problem by yourself there

is no sense in callin’ the cops.” At Clayton, students like Brent who described having a “bad

family name,” were more likely in my interviews to eschew the use of school or police authority

and to specifically invoke an anti-snitching mantra. These students shared experiences and were

socialized into a mindset that produced serious misgivings about school and police authority.

Such misgivings formed the catalyst for the development of an anti-snitching mentality among

students at both schools.

“Snitches End Up in Ditches”

The skepticism regarding institutional authority and interest in “handling the problem by

yourself” congealed into a habitus that discouraged snitching. The lexicon of “snitching” was

perhaps derived from popular media, but it found purchase among students at both schools

because of their particular conditions of experience. Interestingly, various students at both

schools described this same anti-snitching code, including girls and boys, and academically

engaged and disengaged students.

A student named Kaycee at Clayton stated that she “didn’t have a good last name,” but

she performed well academically, participated in several sports and activities at the school, took

advanced “college prep” courses, and planned on attending a four-year college. Yet she also

portrayed an anti-snitching stance:

EM: Does anybody avoid fights by telling a teacher or telling [the principal], like “hey this person’s messing with me” – can that be done, or is that worse?

Kaycee: Yeah, ‘cause they’ll still want to fight you after school, so there’s no point. […] They’re gonna be like, snitch! Snitch! Snitches end up in ditches! [said like a chant].

EM: So there’s kind of a code in the community for not snitching?

Kaycee: Right. Yeah, everyone knows that snitches end up in ditches.

Previous research has assumed anti-snitching to be a primarily urban, African American

phenomenon. But Kaycee depicts it as a community code in the almost entirely white, rural

community of Clayton. This suggests that anti-snitching might be more widespread than

commonly believed. And as the students state, this mentality not only functioned within

community life, but also infiltrated schools, affecting school discipline and conflict. Just as

street offenders in previous research (Rosenfeld et al. 2003; Topalli 2005) eschewed working

with police, so too did my student interviewees eschew working with school authorities.

Maintaining the Anti-snitching Code

This perspective on snitching might ostensibly point to an inverted value system. However, a

deeper analysis of the interviews reveals a more flexible, strategic assessment of snitching. The

mantra of “stop snitching” is associated with organized crime, and earlier manifested itself in the

mafia enforcement of “omerta” or the code of silence (Kahn 2007). Interestingly, Janna at

Clayton referenced the mafia in her description of anti-snitching social control:

EM: But if somebody’s gonna get, if somebody else is gonna get hurt because of it [snitching], like if the cops are gonna get into it, then it’s not okay?

Janna: Like, if the cops are gonna come after you because they know something is gonna hurt you, maybe…But it’s like the mafia. It would be like the mafia. And that way – it would be wrong, but kinda right, like both. You should, but then you shouldn’t. And plus if you did, then they’d come after you then!

This quote demonstrates Janna’s ambivalence about snitching. She indicates that in some cases,

snitching might be acceptable. She also appears to understand how some might see anti-

snitching as wrong, saying it would be “wrong, but kinda right.” Kenda, a student at Woodrow

Wilson, expressed a similar ambivalence when she said “like they say that [telling a teacher is]

what we’re supposed to do, but it’s kind of messed up that we can’t.” Students seemed to realize

that telling someone about a conflict was encouraged by formal authorities, but strongly

discouraged under certain circumstances within their social milieu. Thus “snitching” had to be

approached strategically.

Students perceived utilizing formal authorities as ineffective, which can be seen as part of

a habitus that emphasized independent conflict resolution. A girl named Shontae at Woodrow

Wilson said this:

You don’t want to do that [snitch] because it comes back to you in a negative way. […] Like I can understand telling an administrator or something like “so and so just fought somebody” or “they’re over there fighting,” like I can understand telling something like

that. But if you’re telling somebody before it actually happens…that just makes the situation worse.

Students at both schools thus described anti-snitching as internally ingrained, but also somewhat

variable. This highlights the “practical sense” (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992: 22) of the anti-

snitching code: it depended largely on the situation, and students underscored that snitching was

less effective than resolving disputes independently.

As I mentioned, even high performing, school-attached students demonstrated an anti-

snitching stance. Ivory at Woodrow Wilson, for example, was actually the top-ranked student in

her class academically when I interviewed her. Yet even she disavowed snitching:

Ivory: I think they would probably like just handle [a student dispute] themselves instead of telling a teacher or something like that. But then again when I was in middle school that [snitching] did happen. And everybody just got on the girl for doing that. Because I think she told one of her teachers […] So I don’t think, like I don’t think people should just go and tell it.

Thus, even a school-focused student such as Ivory thought that snitching was not effective, again

emphasizing handling conflicts without interference from school authorities. Such sentiments

should not imply the acceptance of broader oppositional values. Ivory, along with many of my

interviewees, did not oppose school, resist authority, or adhere to a criminal street culture. The

anti-snitching mentality instead emerged from a habitus that emphasized self-reliance born from

logical skepticism of external, formal means of control. Anti-snitching and subcultural values

are not the same thing – someone can be cynical of school or police authority without opposing

education or criminal justice in the abstract. Ivory herself makes this distinction quite clear.

Although she expressed and described an anti-snitching mentality, she was a student leader of an

active peer-mediation group at the school. In this group, Ivory and other students helped

classmates resolve problems themselves without the direct intervention of school officials. Far

from an acceptance of fighting or other forms of insubordination, this group worked within the

confines of anti-snitching norms to settle differences and maintain a positive school climate.

Through this example we can envision ways forward for research and school policy regarding

“snitching.”

CONCLUSION

This paper advances the sociological study of crime and education in several ways. First, it

demonstrates the broad reach of the “stop snitching” mentality. Previously, most commentators

located this code almost exclusively within the African American community, and among street

offenders. My research reveals acceptance of this mentality among teenage high school students,

white rural teenagers, and high achieving students attached to school through participation in

school sponsored activities, clubs, and sports. My research adds to previous work on snitching

(Rosenfeld et al. 2003; Topalli 2005) by finding anti-snitching adherence among rural people as

well as people who are not hardcore criminal offenders. These amendments call for a new way

of understanding anti-snitching which links it to an organic and local outgrowth of current and

historical structured experience. It is not a function of race, urban location, or criminal activity

necessarily, but rather a collective response to institutional marginalization, which may be found

within a number of disadvantaged communities.

I suggest that Bourdieu’s notion of habitus helps explain the problem of anti-snitching.

Habitus can capture the fact that “stop snitching” has indeed become codified in certain

communities. However, because of the flexibility and experiential basis of habitus, it does not

imply that anti-snitching is rooted in torpid oppositional values. Instead, Bourdieu’s framework

emphasizes the structured experience (historical and current marginalization from formal

authority) that forges a set of perceptions (distrust of formal authority; emphasis on personal

dispute resolution), allowing for the nesting of anti-snitching principles and strategies of action.

None of my interviewees were active criminals, and it is unlikely that many will become such

criminals. Yet, they described a way of handling disputes that differed from conventional rules

proffered by police, school, and middle-class America. This does not mean that they adopted an

oppositional value system, just that they developed a different strategy of action that

circumvented formal, institutionalized means of social control.

The concept of habitus also provides a different way for school and other forms of

institutionalized authority to combat the problem of anti-snitching. The “stop snitching”

mentality and the way many school authorities currently respond to student disputes form a

seemingly intractable impasse. As many of my respondents indicated, students should feel safe

and not intimidated in their schools (and communities). A blanket social code against working

with authorities can compromise safety if not acted upon appropriately by these authorities.

Much previous commentary regarding anti-snitching, especially in the popular press, has simply

denigrated it as a subversive form of oppositional intimidation. This view can lead to methods of

policing or school discipline that “get tough” with potential troublemakers in a misguided

attempt to fracture this code (Rosenfeld et al. 2003). A similar approach involves the use of

school resource officers to infiltrate student networks and “establish a bond of trust” in order to

procure tips that could lead to student arrests (Newman et al. 2004: 281). My findings suggest

that such criminal justice-inspired policies would exacerbate the code of silence. Because stop

snitching emerges from a logical and durable habitus based on ambivalence to authority and an

emphasis on independent conflict-resolution, cracking down with more authoritarian or invasive

measures would only increase the code’s strength. Particularly if students perceive strict or

invasive school discipline as biased, they might resist school authority more vehemently,

increasing the social distance between students and the school (Kupchik and Ellis 2008).

A better approach to resolving student conflicts in low-income schools is an active peer

mediation program. Ivory and some other students at Woodrow Wilson engaged in this program,

but it was small and did not adequately pervade the school. More active programs such as this

could be effective because they recognize and build from a habitus emphasizing conflict

resolution among peers, instead of challenging this habitus by threatening punishment from

external formal authority.

Finally, this paper suggests the need for more research in criminology and sociology of

education on anti-snitching and perceptions of formal authority. Future research might explore

other variations in acceptance of this mentality, such as why law-abiding people in

disadvantaged communities might agree (or disagree) with “stop snitching.” Gender could serve

as another interesting line of research. Most of the outspoken critics of snitching and enforcers

of anti-snitching (both now and historically) have been men, but my results do not show

discernable gender differences. Because of the relationship between gender and crime

(Messerschmidt 2000; Miller 2001), there is probably more to the story of snitching and gender.

This and other work on “snitching” has potential to teach us more about how students perceive

school authority and suggest more effective and fair ways to create a positive school climate.

NOTE

1. The notion of habitus used here is closest to the value attenuation/procedural injustice approach to urban youths’ distrust of police (see Carr, Napolitano, and Keating 2007). However, the concept of habitus can act as a bridge between subcultural and value attenuation models

because it is a relatively “durable” product of objective conditions which becomes ingrained, but maintains flexibility and adaptive capacity.

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