Is the Black Family Only A Myth? Essay

Individuality was not stressed but rather the importance of the extended family. I believe that African Americans suffering through the hardships of slavery strengthened the idea of kinship even further. The unity of the African culture became strong due to a series of trials and tribulations.

In this debate, the discussion will surround whether or not slavery destroyed the Black family. A family is a social unit living together and people descended from a common ancestor. The debate focuses on Wilma A. Dunaway who posits that slavery did destroy the Black family, and her opponent, Eugene D. Genovese, who says that slavery did not destroy the Black family. By analyzing Dunway, Genovese, and a host of other writers I have gather my own ideas for one side to agree with.

     The African-American family is defined as networks of households related by blood, marriage, or function that provide basic instrumental and expressive functions of the family to the members of those networks (Hill, 1999). It is one of the strongest institutions throughout history, and still today. Family strengths are considered to be cultural assets that are transmitted through socialization from generation to generation and not merely adaptations or coping responses to contemporary racial or economic oppression (McDaniel 1994; Hill 1999). This definition is contrary to the belief that the Black family is an adaptation to harsh conditions, instead of an ongoing establishment. Hill (1999) discusses

In some approaches enslaved African American families very a great deal resembled other households who lived in other instances and places and under vastly unique instances. Some husbands and better halves cherished each different; some did now not get alongside. Children on occasion abided by determine’s policies; different instances they followed their own minds. Most mother and father cherished their children and desired to shield them. In some critical approaches, even though, the slavery that marked everything about their lives made these families very specific. Belonging to every other individual delivered unique constrictions, disruptions, frustrations, and ache.

The arguments presented by Dr. Joy DeGruy reflect a history of America that people long to forget. Because of the reality that Black people are abused, underrepresented and economically excluded from the society in America due to the history of chattel slavery, speaks volumes. American slavery began in 1619 and all the way through the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865 African people were brutally tortured, forcefully placed in contention, sold, and raped. This can be defined as the worst forms of treatment physically, emotionally, and psychologically. Dr. Joy DeGruy presents that Black people today still suffer from the trauma of their ancestors because there was no time or treatment given after the emancipation of slaves. Dr. DeGruy poses many important questions that pertain to the evolution of trauma in Black communities in America such as; isn’t it likely that slaves were severely traumatized? And did that trauma and the effects of the trauma end when slavery was abolished?

Williams, Heather Andrea. “How Slavery Affected African American Families.” Freedom’s Story, TeacherServe©. National Humanities Center. DATE YOU ACCESSED ESSAY.

After reading Anderson's book, I feel that as a consequence of poverty and scarcity of resources in African American communities described by the author, the form of organization of the family is much like the extended family instead of nuclear family. Somehow they share what they in the family and help each other. The male takes on the challenge of manhood at an early age, and to show that manliness is crucial to survive and be respected in the community.

In 1908, W.E.B. Dubois explored the weakness among the black family in The Negro American Family (1908) where he claimed that slavery destructed the African American family. Over a century later, former President Barack Obama echoed the thoughts of W.E.B. Dubois stating that “too many fathers [are] missing – missing from too many lives and too many homes... in the African-American community” (Miller, 2010). There are two dominant reasons today for the weakness of the black family – the mass incarceration of the black man and the killing of the black man through police brutality, all which root from institutionalized slavery in white America. The elimination of the black man from African-American families has affected black womanhood greatly. Historians and scholars argue that a “matrifocal (mother-centered) family became typical of African Americans both during slavery and after emancipation and has been

The troubles for African Americans traces back to a period where nothing was a privilege nor was granted. Throughout my readings it is difficult to justify the accurate meanings of how the individuals in each reading felt. As I kept to my readings I discovered what African Americans’ spirit, money, education, and liberty meant to them. At time’s their spirits would rise in optimism to a grand life for them and their loved one’s, but it being problematic with the prejudice whites who kept knocking them down. Their financials were no better as to being paid little or slim to none. If fortunate enough to make a couple of cents for the hours of hard labored days that passed for the African American’s. Education was foreign to blacks as the whites

Frederick Douglass, having lived through the hardships of slavery for a large portion of his life, gives many examples of the damage it did to himself and fellow slaves. He explains how slavery broke up families for the purpose of stripping slaves of their basic human rights. “I never saw my mother, to know her as such, more than four or five times in my life; and each of these times was very short in duration, and at night” (Douglass 2). He was never granted the opportunity to become close with his mother, denying him of the normal love and attention a

On November 2nd, 2017, JSTOR DAILY published an article called “Ralph Ellison On Race and Family”. The article focuses on his new book title “What America Would Be Like Without Black”, explaining the recent and current social and economic inequality blacks have faced and the effects it’s had on the family structure of African American homes. The piece explores the idea of African American family structure and lifestyle and it’s connection to American history and present. In addition, this can be tied to the conflict perspective set forth by Karl Marx.

Modern American culture has largely forgotten the establishment of slavery and the disturbing, psychological pain that Africans and African Americans had to endure. The history of black people in America has been filled with traumatic experiences they faced during slavery, which has influenced their personalities and their connection with themselves and others. In order to overcome the trauma of slavery requires remembering the atrocities faced by slaves rather than forgetting them.

This paper explores the events that shaped my life up until this point. The paper analyzes experiences that I have had in my short 19 years alive. I delve into the particulars of being raised in a broken home by my mother. Also being addressed is how that event altered my outlook on people and life. Being black is not just about the color of someone’s skin. There is a responsibility that comes with it. During different stages of my life, things have occurred bringing my closer to realizing my responsibility as a black person. The paper also demonstrates my willingness to become an aware Black person.

     The history of the black family is difficult to research according to Barnetta McGhee White because there are few written documents to substantiate the oral history (Staples, 1991 p.50). In terms of the prevailing meta-narrative, familial ties must be documented by family trees. Black families, due to the breakdown of the family through the slave trade, rely on oral history to tell the story of their lineage (Staples, 1991, p 51). The genealogy of author Barnetta McGhee White helps illustrate certain points. The first is that since a majority of the research into genealogy is dependent on written documents dating into the founding years of this nation, these documents are only telling what the writer wants the reader to know. The history of black families is told through the story of the slaveholder and, thus, gives information relevant to the business of slavery—everything that measurable. Another point is that those in power in the past control the future. If current society is viewed in chronicled terms, there is little control blacks can have over the account of their family history because it will always be in terms of the dominant meta-narrative based on modernity. The conclusion to be made by the former points is that modern thought is to blame for stereotypes against blacks.

“First and most important, [the Moynihan Report] is fast becoming the scriptural basis for several new brands of bigotry, even without the consent of its authors” (Farmer). Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s The Negro Family: The Case for National Action, also known as the Moynihan Report, caused much controversy in the 1960s due to the blame Moynihan placed on the black community for their own inequality. Although Moynihan attempts to accurately study the inequality between white and black households and the reasons behind this disparity, he, whether intentionally or unintentionally, perpetuates systemic oppression against the black community by giving the white community an opportunity to blame black poverty on the black people rather than owning up to their own role in this situation. Meanwhile, the society Toni Morrison sets up in Beloved disputes the issues expressed in the Moynihan report, especially Moynihan’s claim that blacks cannot be economically equal to whites due to the high rates of both illegitimate births and households headed by females in the black community. Toni Morrison’s Beloved proves it is not as easy for blacks to pull themselves out of their situations as many whites during this time period may think by... (be more specific?)