Description
Book SynopsisAasha M. Abdill draws on fieldwork in Bedford-Stuyvesant to dispel stereotypes of black men as deadbeat dads. She presents qualitative and quantitative evidence of black fathers' presence and shows how supporting black men in their quest to be—and be seen as—family men is key to securing not only their children's well-being but also their own.
Trade ReviewHas involved fatherhood among low-income men existed all along with no public recognition, or is such parenting increasing through changing social norms and cultural forms? The answer is not exclusively one or the other. In exploring this question, Aasha M. Abdill has written a beautiful and honest ethnography of low-income black fathers in Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant community that neither romanticizes nor pathologizes them. She traces the strategies fathers use to fulfill societal expectations of provision and caretaking and to reconcile the 'cool pose' with warm parent-child interactions. Through her keen observations and interviews with fathers, teachers, mothers, and grandmothers, Abdill handily illustrates how fatherhood is a collective enterprise that by its public practice generates more of the same. -- Roberta Coles, author of The Myth of the Missing Black Father
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
1. Misunderstood: The Significance of Race and Place in Understanding Black Fatherhood
2. Men with Children: The Changing Landscape of Urban Fatherhood
3. In and Out: The Poses and Performances of Black Fathers
4. Something Between All and Nothing: Strategies for Keeping Hold of Family
5. The Black Maternal Garden: Maternal Gatekeeping in the Context of Grandmothers and Community Mothers
6. A Woman’s World: Finding a Place in the Matriarchal Urban Village
7. Conclusion: Black Men as Family Men
Appendix: A Reflection on Methods
Notes
References
Index
