Family wasn't an accident. It signalled the presence of a new people, at the turn of a new century, whose discovery of Brooklyn had just begun. Chapter 42 Now a sophomore, Dasani believes that her family is desperately fractured. People often remark on her beauty the high cheekbones and chestnut skin but their comments never seem to register. And at first, she thrived. But despite the extraordinary opportunity, she talked often about just wanting to go home as troublesome as that home life was. Nine years ago, my colleague Andrea Elliott set out to report a series of stories about what it was like to be a homeless child in New York City. What Hershey calls code switching, which is you switch between the norms, the linguistic codes, and behaviors of one place to another so that you can move within both worlds or many worlds. The journalist will never forget the first time she saw the family unit traveling in a single file line, with mother Chanel Sykes leading the way as she pushed a stroller. Sort of, peak of the homeless crisis. "What's Chanel perfume? Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope The bottled water had come to Brooklyns bodegas just before she was born, catching the fancy of her mother, who could not afford such indulgences. And in the very beginning, I was like, "Oh, I don't think I can hear this." Her eyes can travel into Manhattan, to the top of the Empire State Building, the first New York skyscraper to reach a hundred floors. I mean, this was a kid who had been, sort of, suddenly catapulted on to the front page of The New York Times for five days. And this is a current that runs through this family, very much so, as you can see by the names. Their voucher had expired. This is the place where people go to be free. Thats not gonna be me, she says. Life has been anything but easy for 20-year-old Dasani Coates. Thats a lot on my plate.. It's painful. I mean, whether you're poor--, Andrea Elliott: --or you're wealthy, (LAUGH) like, you know. What happens when trying to escape poverty means separating from your family at 13? In New York, I feel proud. She loved to sit on her windowsill. Not much. And she was actually living in the very building where her own grandmother had been born back when it was Cumberland Hospital, which was a public hospital. Elliott says she was immediately drawn to 11-year-old Dasani not only because of the girls ability to articulate injustices in her life, but how Desani held so much promise for herself. And she wants to be able to thrive there. The book is called Invisible Child. Poverty and homelessness in the details: Dasani Children are not the face of New Yorks homeless. After Dasanis family left the homeless shelter, she was accepted to the Milton Hershey School, a tuition-free boarding school for low-income children in Pennsylvania. So Chanel is in Bed-Stuy. And it really was for that clientele, I believe. (LAUGH), Chris Hayes: You know? The citys wealth has flowed to its outer edges, bringing pour-over coffee and artisanal doughnuts to places once considered gritty. Then the New York Times published Invisible Child, a series profiling a homeless girl named Dasani. Dasani can get lost looking out her window, until the sounds of Auburn interrupt. Andrea Elliott: Yeah. After that, about six months after the series ran, I continued to follow them all throughout. 11:12 - And so you can get braces. Just a few blocks from townhouses that were worth millions of dollars. 6. And I think showing the dignity within these conditions is part of that other lens. And this book really avoids it. Invisible Child But you know what a movie is. is presented by MSNBC and NBC News, produced by the All In team and features music by Eddie Cooper. And in all these cases, I think, like, you know, there's a duty for a journalist to tell these stories. It's now about one in seven. The difference is in resources. Her parents survived major childhood traumas. In fact, there's the, kind of, brushes that the boys have with things outside of their, kind of, experience of poverty and class have to do with, like, parking cars (LAUGH) or helping cars and stuff and selling water at the United Center where there's all sorts of, like, fancy Chicago roles through. It doesn't have to be a roof over my head. And at one level, it's like, "It's our ethical duty to tell stories honestly and forcefully and truthfully." Invisible Child She made leaps ahead in math. (LAUGH) Like those kinds of, like, cheap colognes. Chris Hayes: Her parents, Supreme and Chanel, you've, sort of, made allusion to this, but they both struggle with substance abuse. What is that?" The only way to do this is to leave the room, which brings its own dangers. Dasanis room was where they put the crazies, she says, citing as proof the broken intercom on the wall. Dasani, a tiny eleven-year-old girl when the book begins in 2012, has learned the responsibility of caring for her younger siblings. In 2012, there were 22,000 homeless children in New York City. We burn them! Dasani says with none of the tenderness reserved for her turtle. When Dasani Left Home - The New York Times She will focus in class and mind her manners in the schoolyard. The book takes on poverty, homelessness, racism, addiction, hunger, and more as they shape the lives of one remarkable girl and her family. Invisible Child: Girl in the Shadows reportedly was the longest ever published in the newspaper up to that time. This is usually the sound that breaks Dasanis trance, causing her to leave the window and fetch Lee-Lees bottle. That, to be honest, is really home. But she was not at all that way with the mice. They can screech like alley cats, but no one is listening. They have yet to stir. That's so irresponsible." So thats a lot on my plate with some cornbread. It comes loud and fast, with a staccato rhythm. She's like, "And I smashed their eyes out and I'd do this.". Dasani's roots in Fort Greene go back for generations. Today, Dasani lives surrounded by wealth, whether she is peering into the boho chic shops near her shelter or surfing the internet on Auburns shared computer. And they did attend rehab at times. They are true New Yorkers. She was a single mother. And a lot of things then happen after that. She is sure the place is haunted. Multiply her story by thousands of children in cities across the U.S. living through the same experiences and the country confronts a crisis. But what about the ones who dont? How did you feel, you know, about the pipe that's leaking?" And they were, kind of, swanky. The problems of poverty are so much greater, so much more overwhelming than the power of being on the front page of The New York Times. And she became, for a moment, I wouldn't say celebrity, but a child who was being celebrated widely. Delivery charges may apply, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning, 2023 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. She then moved from there to a shelter in Harlem and then to a shelter in the Bronx before finally, once again, landing another section eight voucher and being able to move back into a home with her family. The rap of a security guards knuckles on the door. She said, "Home is the people. Andrea joins to talk about her expanded coverage of the Coates family story, which is told in her new book, Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope In An American City.. INVISIBLE CHILD POVERTY, SURVIVAL & HOPE IN AN AMERICAN CITY. WebBrowse, borrow, and enjoy titles from the PALS Plus NJ OverDrive Library digital collection. With only two microwaves, this can take an hour. And so they had a choice. And they agreed to allow me to write a book and to continue to stay in their lives. And this was all very familiar to me. You have to be from a low income family. Now in her 20s, Dasani became the first in her immediate family to graduate high school, and she enrolled in classes at LaGuardia Community College. with me, your host, Chris Hayes. So Bed-Stuy, East New York. Sometimes she doesnt have to blink. Only a mother could answer it, and for a while their mother was gone. Chris Hayes speaks with Pulitizer Prize-winning journalist and author Andrea Elliott about her book, Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope In An American City., Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope In An American City. They will drop to the floor in silence. And her lips are stained with green lollipop. Andrea Elliott: We love the story of the kid who made it out. She spent eight years falling the story She would walk past these boutiques where there were $800 boots for sale. Massive gentrification occurs in this first decade. (LAUGH) She said to me at one point, "I mean, I want to say to them, especially if it's a man who's saying this, 'Have you ever been through childbirth?'. She would just look through the window. In October of 2012, I was on the investigative desk of The New York Times. And even as you move into the 1820s and '30s when you have fights over, sort of, Jacksonian democracy and, kind of, popular sovereignty and will, you're still just talking about essentially white men with some kind of land, some kind of ownership and property rights. And then I was like, "I need to hear this. Andrea, thank you so much. The familys room at the Brooklyn shelter, with Dasani, right, sitting on the bed. It's just not in the formal labor market. We meet Dasani in 2012, when she is eleven years old and living with her parents, Chanel and Supreme, and "I just want to be a fly on the wall. I think she feels that the book was able to go to much deeper places and that that's a good thing. It's massively oversubscribed. You can try, Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope in an American City., Why the foster care system needs to change as aid expires for thousands of aged-out youth, The Pandemic's Severe Toll On The Already-Strained Foster Care System. There is no separating Dasanis childhood from that of her matriarchs: her grandmother Joanie and her mother, Chanel. We meet Dasani in 2012, when she is eleven years old and living with her parents, Chanel and Supreme, and seven siblings in one of New York City's We get the robber barons and the Industrial Revolution. Her parents are avid readers. "What were you thinking in this moment? The people I grew up with. Andrea has now written a book about Dasani. The ground beneath her feet once belonged to them. I think it's so natural for an outsider to be shocked by the kind of conditions that Dasani was living in. Her hope for herself is to keep, as she's put it to me, her family and her culture close to her while also being able to excel.. What was striking to me was how little changed. Invisible Child emerged from a series on poverty Elliott wrote for the New York Times in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis and the Occupy Wall Street movement. Uncovering 'The Invisible Child' with Andrea Elliott: The smaller children lie tangled under coats and wool blankets, their chests rising and falling in the dark. And that's just the truth. ANDREA ELLIOTT, Just the sound of it Dasani conjured another life. This is Nearly a quarter of Dasanis childhood has unfolded at Auburn, where she shares a 520-square-foot room with her parents and And regardless of our skin color, our ethnicity, our nationality, our political belief system, if you're a journalist, you're gonna cross boundaries. Before that, she had been in and out of shelters with her family. She will kick them awake. Taped to the wall is the childrens proudest art: a bright sun etched in marker, a field of flowers, a winding path. By the time most schoolchildren in New York City are waking up to go to school, Dasani had been working for probably two hours. 'Invisible Child' chronicles how homelessness shaped We'd love to hear from you. Like, you do an incredible job on that. "This is so and so." Dasani And what was happening in New York was that we were reaching a kind of new level. In the book, the major turning points are, first of all, where the series began, that she was in this absolutely horrifying shelter just trying to survive. And the reporter who wrote that, Andrea Elliott, wrote a series of stories about Dasani. In the blur of the citys streets, Dasani is just another face. It's available wherever you get your books. You have piano lessons and tutoring and, of course, academics and all kinds of athletic resources. And then their cover got blown and that was after the series ran. To watch these systems play out in Dasanis life is to glimpse not only their flaws, but the threat they pose to Dasanis system of survival. Chris Hayes: That is such a profound point about the structure of American life and the aspirations for it. Andrea Elliott: This is a work in progress. Elliott first met Dasani, her parents and her siblings in Brooklyns Fort Greene neighborhood in 2012. That image has stayed with me ever since because it was so striking the discipline that they showed to just walk in single file the unity, the strength of that bond, Elliott says. You know? Even Dasanis name speaks of a certain reach. The bodegas were starting. This family is a proud family. Like, these are--. But I know that I tried very, very hard at every step to make sure it felt as authentic as possible to her, because there's a lot of descriptions of how she's thinking about things. I took 14 trips to see her at Hershey. I mean, everything fell on its face. There's a huge separation that happens in terms of the culture that people consume, the podcasts they listen to or don't listen to, the shows they watch. So you mentioned There Are No Children Here. Its the point Elliott says she wants to get across in Invisible Child: We need to focus less on escaping problems of poverty and pivot attention to finding the causes and solutions to those problems. Except for Baby Lee-Lee, who wails like a siren. Her siblings will soon be scrambling to get dressed and make their beds before running to the cafeteria to beat the line. And I did some quick research and I saw that, in fact, the child poverty rate remained one in five. Some girls may be kind enough to keep Dasanis secret. Serena McMahonadapted it for the web. And for most of us, I would say, family is so important. WebPULITZER PRIZE WINNER NATIONAL BESTSELLER A vivid and devastating (The New York Times) portrait of an indomitable girlfrom acclaimed journalist Andrea ElliottFrom its first indelible pages to its rich and startling conclusion, Invisible Child had me, by turns, stricken, inspired, outraged, illuminated, in tears, and hungering for Elliotts book follows eight years in the life of So in There Are No Children Here, you know, if you go over there to the Henry Horner Homes on the west side, you do have the United Center. In 2019, when the school bell rang at the end of the day, more than 100,000 schoolchildren in New York City had no permanent home to return to. Mice scurry across the floor. Dasani's 20. I think about it every day. 'Cause I think it's such an important point. Like, these two things that I think we tend to associate with poverty and, particularly, homelessness, which is mental illness and substance abuse, which I think get--, Chris Hayes: --very much, particularly in the way that in an urban environment, get codified in your head of, like, people who were out and, you know, they're dealing with those two issues and this is concentrated. Who paid for water in a bottle? Dasani is not an anomaly. Whether they are riding the bus, switching trains, climbing steps or jumping puddles, they always move as one. She's had major ups and major downs. One in five kids. And you didn't really have firsthand access to what it looks like, what it smells like to be wealthy. Part of the government. So it's interesting how, you know, you always see what's happening on the street first before you see it 10,000 feet above the ground in terms of policy or other things. I had spent years as a journalist entering into communities where I did not immediately belong or seem to belong as an outsider. One of the first things Dasani will say is that she was running before she walked. Invisible Child She was just one of those kids who had so many gifts that it made her both promising in the sense of she could do anything with her life. Here in the neighbourhood, the homeless are the lowest caste, the outliers, the shelter boogies. Every once in a while, it would. Paired with photographs by colleague Ruth Fremson , it sparked direct action from incoming Mayor Bill DeBlasio, who had Dasani on the stage at his administrations inauguration in January 2014. And about 2,000 kids go there. And it was an extraordinary experience. Like, you could tell the story about Jeff Bezos sending himself into space. Dasani Coates, the 11-year-old homeless child profiled in Andrea Elliotts highly praised five-part New York Times feature, arrived on stage at Wednesdays inauguration ceremonies to serve as a poignant symbol ofin Mayor de Blasios wordsthe economic and social inequalities that threaten to unravel the city we love. A fascinating, sort of, strange (UNINTEL) generous institution in a lot of ways. We have a period where basically from the New Deal to 1980, inequality in the country shrinks and then the story, as you well know, from 1980 to now is just skyrocketing inequality. Alexander Tuerkproduced and edited this interview for broadcast withTodd Mundt. She felt that she left them and this is what happened. Family was everything for them. (LAUGH) And the market produces massively too little affordable housing, which is in some ways part of the story of Dasani and her family, which is the city doesn't have enough affordable housing. This week, an expansion of her reporting comes out within the pages of Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope in an American City.. An interview with Andrea Elliott, author of Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival, and Hope in an American City. Andrea Elliott: So Milton Hershey School was created by America's chocolate magnate Milton Hershey, who left behind no children. What's interesting about that compared to Dasani, just in terms of what, sort of, concentrated poverty is like in the 1980s, I think, when that book is being reported in her is that proximity question. To be poor in a rich city brings all kinds of ironies, perhaps none greater than this: the donated clothing is top shelf. I think what she has expressed to me, I can certainly repeat. Serena McMahon Twitter Digital ProducerSerena McMahon was a digital producer for Here & Now.
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