Public Housing

Film director Barry Jenkins and playwright Tarell McCraney both grew up in the same housing project in Miami, and both were raised by mothers who were addicted to crack. Their new film Moonlight draws on their experiences.

Venkatesh, an Associate Professor of Sociology and Director of African American Studies at Columbia University in New York. His newest book –American Project: The Rise and Fall of the Modern Ghetto,— (Harvard 2000) was awarded the 2000 Professional/ Scholarly Publishing Award of the Association of American Publishers. His research interests are based in investigating the social organization of poor urban neighborhoods. He lives in New York City.

Radio producer David Isay and reporters LeAlan Jones and Lloyd Newman. The new book "Our America: Life and Death on the South Side of Chicago," (Scribner) is compiled from interviews by Jones and Newman conducted at the Ida B. Wells housing project in Chicago, where they live. These are the same two boys who worked with Isay on the acclaimed documentaries, "Ghetto Life 101" and "Remorse: the 14 stories of Eric Morse."

Ladd is a 24-year-old writer who has just published an autobiography, "Out of the Madness." He writes about growing up in the Dallas housing projects with his mother, who was a heroin addict. Ladd describes how he struggled to educate himself and eventually became a writer. His book started out as an article, written when he was 20, and published in "Dallas Life." Ladd currently writes for the "Dallas Morning News," and attends college.

Journalist Alex Kotlowitz won the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award for a series of articles he wrote for the Wall Street Journal chronicling the lives of two children in a housing project in Chicago. He's expanded those articles into the new book, "There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up In the Other America."