Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
single parents in america
single parents in america
single parents in america
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: single parents in america
Being a single mother is not an easy feat. Raising children alone and in broken homes has proven to be difficult for women across the globe. These difficulties seem to multiple when single mother hood takes place in an African American household. Why does this happen? Is it self-inflicted or is there something deeper going on in the mind of the black women that subconsciously leads some to end up being single black mothers? I seek to better understand the dynamic of single black motherhood from a psychological and sociological perspective. Looking at the works of womanist theologians, a solution to this hardship will hopefully arise.
Sociological statistics show that:
In 1950, 17 percent of African-American children lived in a home with their mother but not their father. By 2010 that had increased to 50 percent. In 1965, only eight percent of childbirths in the Black community occurred out-of-wedlock. In 2010 that figure was 41 percent; and today, the out-of-wedlock childbirth in the Black community sits at an astonishing 72 percent. The number of African-American women married and living with their spouse was recorded as 53 percent in 1950. By 2010, it had dropped to 25 percent” (Lloyd).
Sociological data clearly shows that the black family is slowly but surely deteriorating especially in terms of broken homes. From 1950 until now, the amount of black children living only with their mothers has almost tripled. This phenomena can be attributed to many factors. Absent fathers paired with the independency we see in black women are two main reasons that contribute to this issue. These two ideas date back to before the 20th century when slavery was in full effect. “Social theorists have argues that slavery resulted in disorganization...
... middle of paper ...
... a process of internalized oppression and multigenerational transmission in African American families. The Family Journal: Counseling and Therapy for Couples and Families, 12, 230 –242.
Phelps, Jamie T. “Joy Came in the Morning…Confronting the Evil of Social Sin and Socially Sinful Structures.” In A Troubling in My Soul: Womanist Perspectives on Evil and Suffering, pgs. 48-50. Edited by Emilie M. Townes. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1993.
Pyke, Karen D. "What Is Internalized Racial Oppression and Why Don't We Study It? Acknowledging Racism's Hidden Injuries." Sociological Perspectives 53.4 (2010): 553. Print.
Ruggles, Steve. "The Origins of African-American Family Structure." American Sociological Review 59.1 (1994): 136. Print.
Thomas, Linda E. Living Stones in the Household of God: The Legacy and Future of Black Theology. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2004. 39. Print.
Daniel Moynihan’s controversial and needed report opened my and many others’ eyes to the societal issues that African American families face. He claims that the African American condition is caused by the fall of the family. In the Tangle of Pathology he addresses several concerns such as welfare dependence, crime, gaps in educational achievement, and children born to single-mothers as the effects of the demasculinization of Black men and the shift of the matriarchal household. Using historical context, sociology, and psychology he centers his thesis around that the matriarchy in Black families is the main issue compared to patriarchy in White households. In this report, Moynihan shed light on several studies that concluded him to assume
Dorothy E. Roberts exclusively focuses on how single black, unwed mothers are criminalized by the justice system and thrown into jail for petty and non-criminal actions. Unfortunately, these injustices are deemed justifiable by the courts and the state, and therefore the rate of incarcerated black mothers has skyrocketed. This cycle is maintained by politics of race, gender, and class that stereotypes black single mothers as “welfare queens” and dependent on the state. These actions not only affect the women individually, but its affects are felt
Every black male's plight in America can be regarded as a provider for his family. However, society does not afford black males the benefit of feeling secure about providi...
In chapter three of this report a section is established exclusively for matriarchy in the Negro American family. Based on the Moynihan Report, the role of the black woman in the family is to be aware her sense of self, financially, academically, and emotionally, while also uplifting and solidifying the status of the Negro man, as well as her children, both male and female. The genesis of matriarchal dominance amongst the Negro family is, according to Moynihan, education. Moynihan compares various educational rates of white males and females and nonwhite males and females. Statistically sh...
"The Final Call." Black America's Painful Epidemic: Children without Fathers. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Apr. 2014.
In her book, Unequal Childhoods: Class, Race, and Family Life, Annette Lareau argues out that the influences of social class, as well as, race result in unequal childhoods (Lareau 1). However, one could query the inequality of childhood. To understand this, it is necessary to infer from the book and assess the manner in which race and social class tend to shape the life of a family. As the scholar demonstrates, each race and social class usually has its own unique way of child upbringing based on circumstances. To affirm this, the different examples that the scholar presents in the book could be used. Foremost, citing the case of both the White and the African American families, the scholar advances that the broader economics of racial inequality has continued to hamper the educational advancement and blocks access to high-paying jobs with regard to the Blacks as opposed to the Whites. Other researchers have affirmed this where they indicate that the rate of unemployment among the African Americans is twice that of the White Americans. Research further advances that, in contrast to the Whites, for those African Americans who are employed, there is usually a greater chance that they have been underemployed, receive lower wages, as well as, inconsistent employment. This is how the case of unequal childhood based on race comes about; children from the Black families will continue residing in poverty as opposed to those from the white families.
Daniel Patrick Moynihan, an American politician and sociologist, states in his report, The Negro Family: The Case for National Action (1965), that matriarchy is the main contributor to problems within the Black family. He argues that the matriarch prevents the African American family from achieving equality since it exists in a family system that does include a strong presence of a father-figure. Moynihan contends that “the Negro community has been forced into a matriarchal structure which … seriously retards the progress of the group as a whole” (Moynihan 21)....
The twentieth century was a time of tremendous change that commenced with WWI and the Great Depression. While WWI brought countless deaths, the Great Depression affected both urban and rural Americans. Yet, underlying these devastating events was the abuse of black Americans. Both whites and blacks had to cope with the major occurrences of the time, but blacks also faced strife from whites themselves. During the early part of the twentieth century, white Americans Russell Baker and Mildred Armstrong Kalish gained kindred attributes from their families, especially in comparison to that of Richard Wright, a black American. The key differences between the experience of whites and blacks can be found within the mentality of the family, the extent to which they were influenced by their families in their respective lives, and the shielding from the outside world, or lack thereof, by their families. Through the compelling narrations of these three authors, readers can glimpse into this racially divided world from the perspective of individuals who actually lived through it.
African American motherhood differs from White and privileged motherhood because of slavery and the standards society holds for African- American’s. During slavery, Black women took care of their own children until they were taken from them, and care for other’s children that were sold into slavery and separated from their families. Although slavery is over, the effects of slavery linger in various forms, the most surprising: motherhood. I will draw my research from Patricia Hill Collins, the author of Black Women and Motherhood, and Shifting the Center: Race, Class, and Theorizing about Motherhood. In this paper, I will briefly highlight the history of black motherhood whilst weighing on the lasting trauma that affects these women today.
Dysfunctional families play a huge role in many African-American communities and they affect the children as they mature. When people do not have a job or cannot access one, that leads them to poverty. When individuals are in poverty, it is hard to provide for a family or themselves. Many adverse outcomes can happen when a child is living in poverty that will impact their future. Many African-American males are incarcerated which affects their connection with their children. Not having a father in a child’s life can negatively impact them. When parents are not vigilant and have dysfunction happening that allows an opening for sexual abuse to take place whether it is a family member or someone outside of the
Slavery would not recognize the black family structure, often separating mothers from their children or ignoring the relationship between husband and wife. Therefore, it was a great accomplishment for freedmen have control over its structure, such as removing their wives from the field and into a domestic role (85). Ned Cobb wanted to “keep the bucket out of [his wife’s] hands all expect to bring the milk in the house and strain it, prepare it for the family to drink and make butter” (Rosengarten 121). Although freedman like Cobb could exercise this freedom, the white community still did not recognize the black family unit. For example, white landowners did not value black women in domestic roles and often complained of their absence in the fields (Foner 85). By encouraging renting and sharecropping, they placed a premium on labour which sometimes required the wife to return to her labouring role (86). Freed women were viewed by their economic value, while white women were rarely held this perception. This shows how white superiority could inhibit the progression of black communities, even with their personal family
Black women's experiences and those of other women of color have never fit the private -public model. Rather than trying to explain why Black women's work and family patterns deviate from the alleged norm, a more fruitful approach lies in challenging the very constructs of work and families themselves. ("Native")
The last major deterrent of the Negro community from a successful societal presence in America is the sad state of segregated housing. About fifty percent of Negro Americans are in the middle class, however many members of that middle class are living right in the ghettos next to the Negro Americans who are in a perpetual state of deterioration. The reason for this confinement is because white families did not accept Negro families living next to them, across them, or even in the same vicinity as them. Negro housing communities are miles away from white communities and were undersized compared to white communities, so even when middle class Negro Americans have the means to leave certain Negro communities, they do not have the power, the are stuck between a white community and a hard place.
The African American family may consist of a mother, father, children, and a number of extended family members. African Americans are least likely to marry before childbirth. In 2011 it was reported that 72% of black babies were born to unwed mothers(Washington, Jesse). Although the African American family can take many shapes, on average the African American family consist of the mother and the child or a grandparent and a child, making it a single parent home.According to kidcount.org, 72% Of black children are raised by single parent .In many cases, the father is absent. The father's absence is usually related to the males age at the time of fatherhood, fear of responsibility, substance abuse, addiction, death, prior family commitment, and incarceration.
Black men in Jail are having drastic effects upon the black community. The first and arguably most important effect is that it intensifies the problem of single parent households within the black community. When these men are sentenced to prison, they, many times, leave behind a wife/girlfriend and/or children. If they have already have had children, that child must spend multiple years of his/her early life without a primary father figure. In addition, that male's absence is even more prominently felt when the woman has to handle all of the financial responsibilities on her own. This poses even more problems since women are underpaid relative to men in the workforce, childcare costs must be considered, and many of these women do not have the necessary skills to obtain a job, which would pay a living wage, which could support her and the children. Black male incarceration has done much to ensure that black female-headed households are now equal with poverty.