Over the past 50 years, the streets of Philadelphia have been a living laboratory for ethnographer Elijah Anderson. He’s been on the ground here since 1975 studying the people and the culture of our city. He’s published his findings in a series of groundbreaking books that have brought the lessons he’s learned in Philly to the rest of the world.



This is the second half of a two-part series. In this episode, we’ll pick up the story where Professor Anderson tries to understand the rise in violence in Philly streets.



Elijah Anderson is currently the Sterling Professor of Sociology and of African American Studies at Yale University. He’s the author of A Place on the Corner (1978), Streetwise (1990), Code of the Street (1999), the Cosmopolitan Canopy (2011), and Black in White Space (2021). In 2021, Professor Anderson was awarded the international Stockholm Prize in Criminology for his pioneering work. The Stockholm Prize in Criminology is awarded for outstanding achievement in criminological research and the advancement of human rights.



Code of the Streets is being re-released by W.W. Norton in Spring 2025 with a new introduction by Professor Anderson.