Summary And Analysis Of Lawrence Graham's Our Kind Of People

Summary and Analysis of Graham’s Our Kind of People Within Our Kind of People, Lawrence Graham illustrates the attitudes, lifestyle, and organizations of black elites within the United States after the 1950s. Graham provides a highly detailed account of exclusive groups for the black elite, such as the Links, Boule, AKAs, Deltas, and Jack and Jill. These secretive groups provided the black elite with relationships and connections to other black elite members from childhood to late adulthood. Young African American children gain role models and relationships with other black children through Jack and Jill. After the children have been exposed to the high level of education and lavish lifestyle of the black elite, they move on to university, where most of the children attend a black university or college. At college, upper-class black students are expected to join the exclusive sororities and fraternities of AKA, Delta, and Omega. Their membership to these sororities and fraternities pad their resumes and are crucial for establishing their social status for late adulthood.

The possibility of getting into the exclusive groups of the Links and Boule is extremely slim if one does not meet the required standard of being a former Jack and Jill member, AKA or Omega, graduate of a black university, and possess a professional career. In order to gain membership one requires the necessary connections and networking in order to gain an invitation to join. Since these groups consisted of long-waitlists and people who went to great lengths to get noticed by the organizations, these elite societies are highly esteemed. In order to gain admittance to these exclusive institutions, one usually must be raised within the black elite in order to gain the same status later in life making entry into these organizations impossible for those who did grow up as a part of the