Date of Award

1990

Document Type

Research Paper

First Advisor

Joe Fairbanks

Abstract

The Zoot Suit Riots began as a set of altercations between groups of zoot-suit wearing Hispanic youth gangs of the Los Angeles area and sailors on leave from near by military bases. The sailors initially attacked Hispanic zoot suit-wearing youths because they thought that these young men had been involved in gang activity against military personnel. The effects of these initial conflicts snowballed into racial riots which lasted more than a week. Once the riots started, gang members were not the only Mexican-Americans to fall victims to the beatings administered by the growing mobs. Other Hispanics in the surrounding Los Angeles area also were attacked, as the riots took on an increasingly racial aspect. The nature of the mobs changed as well, becoming more diversified and incorporating other branches of the armed forces as well as civilians. The paper will examine the causes and effects of these riots, explore the nature of these riots when they began, and examine how these riots changed as they progressed. The paper will also look at the different attitudes of the Anglo and Hispanic communities toward the riots and the participants in the riots.

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