Workshop 12: Practice Visualization – Alcohol Related Deaths
The above bar graph illustrates the ethnic distribution of people who died as a result of criminal activity associated with alcohol consumption in Chicago between 1875 and 1930. This information can be divided into two major groups. One group is the ‘non-discriminated group,’ the group from ethnic backgrounds that are from the majority groups of the American population. In the above bar graph this groups would be represented by “English-Anglo” and “Other Europeans” who, by process of elimination, are largely ‘western Europeans.’ These ethnic groups held the vast majority of political and economic power. The second group is made up of groups who were politically and economically discriminated against during the time period 1875-1930. African-Americans were the most prominently discriminated against at this time in U.S. history, other groups were discriminated against because of political or religious beliefs – it was believed most Germans were socialists, the Irish were Catholic (therefore, more loyal to the Pope than to the U.S.) and drunkards, other Eastern and Southern Europeans were illiterate in their own language and were largely unskilled laborers. Of those who died as a result of alcohol related crimes, 57.5% were English-Anglo and ‘Other European.’ A study of the ethnic groups who make up the population of Chicago during this time period would need to be superimposed over this bar graph in order to determine if the 57.5% who were killed is proportionate to those who lived there. Conversely, for the 42.5% of those killed from the ‘discriminated’ groups the population – did that statistic match the percentage of population made up of these groups in Chicago during the time period?The above bar graph illustrates the ethnic distribution of people who were defendants in criminal activity associated with alcohol consumption in Chicago, Illinois between 1875 and 1930. This information can be divided into two major groups. One group is the ‘non-discriminated group,’ the group from backgrounds that are from the majority groups of the American population. In the above bar graph this groups would be represented by “English-Anglo” and “Other Europeans” who, by process of elimination, are largely ‘western Europeans.’ These ethnic groups held the vast majority of political and economic power. The second group is made up of groups who were politically and economically discriminated against during the time period 1875-1930. African-Americans were the most prominently discriminated against at this time in U.S. history, other groups were discriminated against because of political beliefs – it was believed most Germans were socialists, the Irish were Catholic (therefore, more loyal to the Pope than to the U.S.) and drunkards, other Eastern and Southern Europeans were illiterate in their own language and were largely unskilled laborers. Of those who were charged with alcohol related crimes that resulted in a death, 56% were English-Anglo and ‘Other European.’ A study of the ethnic groups who make up the population of Chicago during this time period would need to be superimposed over this bar graph in order to determine if the 56% who were charged with these crimes is proportionate to those who lived there. Conversely, for the 44% of those charged from the ‘discriminated’ groups the population – did that statistic match the percentage of population made up of these groups in Chicago during the time period? A closer study to compare the information in the two bar graphs would need to be undertaken to determine who killed whom. Were most of these crimes basically ‘non-discriminated’-on-‘non-discriminated’ groups crime and ‘discriminated’-on-‘discriminated’ group crime – even looking more closely to determine if the crimes were within ethnic groups.The line graph illustrates the number of persons who died in Chicago, Illinois in some way related to the consumption of alcohol from 1875 to 1930. The graph clearly demonstrates that as the population of Chicago grew; the number of deaths increased (with exception of the year 1921). However, it would be useful to have a graph of population growth super-imposed over the same period of time to answer the question – did the increase in murders in Chicago correspond to the increase of population in Chicago? Also, during the era of Prohibition, it would be useful to look at how many of the deaths were crime related – in the sense of criminal ‘turf wars’ or a similar incident.
