Smack: Heroin and the American City

Eric C. Schneider

Published by University of Pennsylvania Press 2009

Smack

Heroin and the American City

Eric C. Schneider

In the series Politics and Culture in Modern America

https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812203486

Overview
Contents

About this book

Why do the vast majority of heroin users live in cities? In his provocative history of heroin in the United States, Eric Schneider explains what is distinctively urban about this undisputed king of underworld drugs.

Author / Editor information

Eric C. Schneider is Adjunct Associate Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania and author of Vampires, Dragons, and Egyptian Kings: Youth Gangs in Postwar New York.

Reviews

"Schneider has produced that rarest of academic commodities—a page-turner. The book is exceedingly well written, and its fascinating research and analysis are sure to make it a central text in the field."—Journal of American History

"Deeply researched and briskly written, with rare photographs and biographical vignettes to keep the narrative moving along, Smack . . . is a triumph of imaginative historical scholarship, though a bittersweet one, written by someone in obvious mourning for the drug-accelerated decline of America's great cities."—Addiction

"A sympathetic, engaging, and highly readable antidote to the war-on-drugs-style morality tale. At times the book reads like the award-winning and controversial HBO television series The Wire. . . . Schneider draws his audience into a colorful narrative complete with larger-than-life characters, heart-tugging tragedies, and triumphant victories that complicate a more simplistic rendering of what constitutes right and wrong, legal and illegal, or mainstream and black market. He effectively humanizes the issue with testimony from users, dealers, traffickers, police, politicians, and educators to show how all parties in this conflict have struggled to bring justice and security to their communities."—American Historical Review

"A thoughtful, measured, and eminently readable study of that illuminating place where urban and medical history meet the study of media and policymaking. Schneider's book will not only be relevant to academics, but to any general reader concerned with the challenging world of crime and social policy. The author's tone of lucid clarity is particularly welcome in an area marked by polemic and predictable advocacy."—Charles Rosenberg, The Care of Strangers: The Rise of America's Hospital System

"Schneider's absorbing history of heroin's proliferation in America draws a parallel between the evolution and decline of American cities and the rise of heroin use. Rather than treating the city as a "backdrop," Schneider interprets cities as 'the organizers of the world opium market,' and meticulously traces heroin's ascendancy from early 20th century opium dens to the 1920s jazz milieu and into the suburbs of the late 20th century when heroin finally attracted the attention of the mainstream media."—Publisher's Weekly

"Since the end of World War II, American cities have been home to illicit drug markets where heroin has been among the most widely-sold products. Smack is Eric Schneider's masterful explanation of how heroin entered America's cities, who used it, what happened as a result and how obtuse public policy and naked corruption not only failed to check its distribution but sometimes even contributed to its spread. Schneider exposes the deep misconceptions underlying the nation's futile war on drugs and offers sane and realistic alternatives that, historic experience suggests, could work, if only public authorities have the courage and will."—Michael Katz, The Price of Citizenship: Redefining the American Welfare State

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
CONTENTS Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
INTRODUCTION: REQUIEM FOR THE CITY Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	ix
CHAPTER ONE. New York and the Global Market Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
CHAPTER TWO. Jazz Joints and Junk Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	17
CHAPTER THREE. The Plague Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	35
CHAPTER FOUR. The Panic over Adolescent Heroin Use Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	51
CHAPTER FIVE. Ethnicity and the Market Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	75
CHAPTER SIX. The Rising Tide Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	98
CHAPTER SEVEN. Dealing with Dope Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	116
CHAPTER EIGHT. Heroin Suburbanizes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	142
CHAPTER NINE. The War and the War at Home Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	159
CHAPTER TEN. From the Golden Spike to the Glass Pipe Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	182
CONCLUSION. Heroin Markets Redux Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	196
NOTES Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	205
INDEX Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	245
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	257

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Audience: College/higher education;
Pages
- Main content: 280
Illustrations
- Other: 14 illus.
Keywords: American History; American Studies; Urban Studies

eBook

Published: April 19, 2013
ISBN: 9780812203486