African American Family Structure

Racial socialization is currently a major issue within today’s society. There are many different ways it can stem from such as your parents, friends, media, or community. People that choose to discriminate against others fail to realize that it can have a huge, negative impact on themselves and society. Such topic relates to early childhood education because young children are at the age where their social and cognitive development can be shaped into thinking or acting a certain way. Therefore, early childhood educators have the ability to teach young ones to have positive racial attitudes. I believe speaking on such topic is important and beneficial to bring awareness to help others understand that racism is not okay and we should do what we can to prevent it from expanding.

Author Harriette Pipes McDoo addresses how family values are influenced by racism in her book, Black Families. She expounds that the challenges faced by African American families have given them the ability to strengthen their core family values through overcoming racially fueled injustices (McDoo 69-71). Factors like racism, poverty, and the fight for equal rights are all factors which vary across the nation within each household affecting individual family value systems. Along with the challenges of adversity, each passing generation inside of American culture have emphasized less and less on multigenerational relationships with families moving and growing into new families to new locations. This rift in the familial structure stems from the evolution of the traditional family combined with the self-motivated desire to succeed

African American students account for the larger majority of minorities in public schools in the United States. Most areas in the northern part of the United states and coastal areas are ethnically diverse. However, down south this is not the case. Students of color will experience a harder time in the education system. African American students meet the obstacle of educators who will not want them to succeed based on a preconceived thought. In fact, Caucasian teachers make up for 85% of all

The number of two-parent African American households is dissolving. According to the U.S. Bureau of the Census, the black family has declined from 80% in 1890 to 39% in 1990. The result of conflict, and warring souls in the African American community, this trend can be stopped and reversed. The African American family must first gain an understanding of what is causing this dissolution, then they can be taught about what principals and skills they must adapt in order to reverse it. Once this is accomplished, the black family must be given opportunities to share this information. By taking these steps, two-parent African American families would once again be prevalent in the United States.

With a missing male role model (father figure), the oldest child of a set of multiples tends to take on the other parents responsibities making the younger siblings look at them as a parental figure. This could mean doing simple chores like keeping the house clean, all the way to helping out financially. This phenomenon is called parentification. Parentification is all too common in African American families today. The missing father figure is seen as one of the main reasons for African Americans disciplinary problems, psychological health, and lowered academic success. Without the knowledge of how to behave in certain situations, the mental/emotional strain, and the already low academic achievement, many black students feel that college is unnecessary and causes them to bring up the question, “How will my family survive without me?”

In the collateral-collectivist cultures (African-American, Hispanic and Asian), emphasis is placed on the family, above all else. This means that in these cultures, even education is second to the needs of a family. When teaching children from these cultures, it is important not be ethnocentric, but rather understand the structure of their cultures. As teachers, we cannot be colorblind; for it is a disservice to those we teach.

The community 's role in providing important guidance and advice to the youth and ensuring negative influences such as crime and drugs are kept at bay protects the youth from leading such destructive lives. This role further reinforces the part played by family in inculcating the right values as the African Americans develop, positively influencing their ability to make appropriate decisions in their lives.

The purpose of this research is to identify the uniqueness and diversity of people and practices of the African American culture. Each culture in life has some similarities and some differences. The similarities and differences that are present in a culture is what make the culture what it is. When dealing with a culture, race, ethnicity, of a people or religion it has a history of where it originates and or a heritage that that culture or people can relate to and always go back to, because this is what sets a

     The flexibility of family roles is important in African-American culture because it contributes to the stability and advancement of numerous black families (Hill, 1999). This ability to adapt to many roles may lead to equality between husband and wife or whoever the caretakers in the home. Sex-specific socialization patterns are dominant in the Euro-American culture and lead to a mostly inferior attitude by white females. In the African-American family, even though there are many egalitarian patterns, the black mother is a lot of times the strongest figure. They are equal to their husbands in that they share work responsibilities inside and outside the home. In the classroom, these strengths can be used to motivate the equal learning of all students. Male and female students should

These solutions center on teacher training. Teachers typically refer children for remedial education testing. For this reason, they are also the first line of defense against the misplacement of African American children. In order to meet the needs of black males, educators ought to develop understanding of their culture. Teachers must be trained to adjust their teaching strategies for culturally different students in class. For instance, rather than emphasizing the deviant characteristics of the black male culture, teachers should focus on the needs which all ethnic groups have in common, such as the need for artistic expression. Educators ought to inform their students about black lifestyles and challenges. They should do this on a regular basis, and not only in special

There is no doubt that African Americans have a rich cultural background and history like the many different ethnic groups who settled in the New World, whose origins lie in another country. For this reason, America was known as the melting pot. However, the backgrounds of each of these cultures were not always understood or, in the case of African Americans, accepted among the New World society and culture. Americans were ignorant to the possibility of differences among groups of people until information and ideas started to emerge, particularly, the African retention theories. This sparked an interest in the field of African culture and retention in African Americans. However, the study of African American culture truly emerged as a result of increased awareness in America, specifically through the publication and findings of scholarly research and cultural events like the Harlem Renaissance where all ethnicities were able to see this rich historical culture of African Americans.

A study was done comparing family structure between whites and blacks to determine how important of a role family structure plays in education. Not to my surprise, most of the percentages were higher among whites, but not by very much in any category. More single mothers who were black were more involved in school planning than white mothers. More black mothers told their children what was educationally expected from them; more talked with their kids daily, and checked their schoolwork.

There is a strong African American cultural presence in this school district one student in particular told me that his uncle and cousin also live with him in their home, which is an asset contributed to African Americans from the days of slavery. Most families were ripped apart during those times and tended to create close familial bonds with friends, cousins, and others that technically were not related, which is a custom from Africa.

Although, Nixon's “War on Drugs” affected Black marriage the rate in which families were staying together was already declining. More families were getting divorced, while some were never marrying. More people were having children out of wedlock which caused stress to the families making them even more divided. Marriage trends for families in general began to decline after the 1960s. The African American family began to spiral in the 1970’s continuing into the 1980’s. What was the reason for this decline? During this time, new jobs were emerging, there were men who were returning home from the war. Families were trying to establish themselves more, however not as a unit any longer, but as their individual selves. In comparison to the 1950s

Black family systems are African in nature and American in nurture. “Africanity” is being in tune with an African worldview, therefore the role that Africanity plays in black families determines the unique form black families take. Africanity is at the root of black families. The operation of the black family is directly linked to African culture through an African attitude, kinship networks, and childbearing.