Ray consulted on county naming controversy
Term 'Ward 9' links a part of Prince Georges County, Maryland, with Washington DC
American University radio station WAMU reported on the emergence of the term "Ward 9" to refer to a part of southern Prince Georges County and consulted with Faculty Associate Rashawn Ray. "I take offense to it, actually,” he said. Ray says he most often hears people who live outside the county use the term, most often in a way that shows the people who live there in a bad light. "You now have middle-class black neighborhoods that are situated beside poorer neighborhoods. That kind of juxtaposition doesn’t happen as much for whites,” he says. “But, on the other hand, it also provides opportunities for middle-class blacks to give poorer blacks access to more resources.”