Philippe Bourgois
A prominent American anthropologist best known for his studies of inner-city America, including In Search of Respect, which is based on his ethnographic fieldwork in East Harlem, where he lived, hung out at…
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Primo
Bourgois’s “closest friend on the streets” of East Harlem, the dealer who runs Ray’s Game Room crackhouse, and, arguably, the figure at the center of the book. Primo is Luis and…
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Ray
The original leader of the network of dealers and crackhouses that Bourgois studies. He offers Bourgois both access to this world and protection from its dangers. They build a “close and privileged relationship,” but Bourgois…
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Luis
Ray’s oldest friend and Felix’s cousin. Luis is a dealer and exceptionally violent crack addict who is married to Wanda before his long stint in jail—although he actually has 12 children with four…
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Caesar
One of Bourgois’s most important confidants in El Barrio, aside Primo, who is Caesar’s best friend and employer. A violent and unstable crack addict, Caesar nevertheless ends up working at the Game…
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Get the entire In Search of Respect LitChart as a printable PDF.
Candy
Wife to Felix and mother of Junior and Jackie, Candy is the only woman Bourgois truly befriends during his time in El Barrio and becomes his main source for his writings on gender and…
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Felix
One of Ray’s oldest friends, Primo’s cousin, Candy’s abusive husband, Esperanza and Luis’s brother, and the founder of the Game Room. He ignores the business side of the Game Room…
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Benzie
One of Primo’s lookouts (a nickname for Benito), who is so cruel to the Game Room’s customers that Primo fires him and replaces him with Caesar. Benzie actually has a legal job…
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Carmen
Caesar’s girlfriend and Maria’s sister (not to be confused with Bourgois’s briefly mentioned neighbor who is also named Carmen). Carmen and Caesar stay together much longer than Primo and Maria do, although…
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Maria
Primo’s girlfriend and sister to Carmen (Caesar’s girlfriend). When she gets pregnant, she is thrilled because it gives her “a romantic escape,” something to care and hope for when her life is…
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Willie
A lookout at the Game Room, crack user, and close friend of Primo’s. He is the only person in Ray and Primo’s network who graduates high school, and he spends some time working…
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Primo’s Mother
A woman who grows up in a small village on a Puerto Rican plantation and then moves to New York City, where she lives in a housing project in El Barrio and sews garments for…
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Gloria
Primo’s white liberal boss at the magazine where he briefly works in the mail room. She is worried about him answering the phone or interacting with customers because of his accent, which shows how…
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Papito
Primo and his ex-girlfriend Sandra’s young son (not to be confused with a dealer also named Papito who is briefly mentioned in Chapter 5). He loves and is always thrilled to see his father, who…
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Little Pete
Another one of Ray’s dealers, and one of Primo’s close friends. Bourgois interviews him and Primo about their families, and Little Pete admits he is an absent and unsupportive father, but that he…
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Junior
Felix and Candy’s son, and Jackie’s brother. During his research, Bourgois watches Junior switch from wanting to become a police officer to transporting drugs and working as a lookout for the Game Room…
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Wanda
Luis’s wife, whom he abuses brutally and who falls deep into addiction after Luis goes to jail. This leads Wanda and Luis to lose their children, whom Felix and Candy subsequently adopt. She internalizes…
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Tony
A dealer who works at the Game Room. When Ray becomes suspicious of Primo and Caesar’s behavior, he hires Tony to run the Game Room part time and cuts Primo’s hours. Tony and…
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Abraham
An elderly, one-eyed, alcoholic man whom Primo “adopts” as a surrogate grandfather and hires to work at the Game Room. Abraham cleans the Game Room and pretends to be senile and collect quarters from…
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Esperanza
Felix’s sister, whom Bourgois repeatedly interviews for the 2003 Epilogue to his book. She struggles with how to address the neighbors’ severe child abuse and tells Bourgois that the police are trying to use…
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Minor Characters
Jackie
Felix and Candy’s daughter, and Junior’s sister. At age 13, her boyfriend and some of his friends kidnap and gang-rape her. The men in Jackie’s family have little sympathy for her. According to Bourgois, this exemplifies the depth of patriarchy and normalization of violence in El Barrio.
Eddie
Primo’s cousin, who went to school with him and experienced similarly adverse conditions there, in addition to abuse from his grandmother. In adulthood, he becomes a bus driver.
