‘Dialling Up’ and ‘Dialling Down’: Exploring the Intensive Mothering Performances of Nigerian Mothers in the UK

Abstract

This article examines how first-generation Nigerian mothers in the United Kingdom navigate and blend intensive motherhood practices with cultural transmission through foodwork. Drawing on qualitative interviews, we demonstrate how these mothers strategically ‘dial down’ and ‘dial up’ their cultural practices in different contexts. While publicly adhering to intensive motherhood ideals, they maintain cultural connections primarily through private spaces, especially through the preparation and consumption of Nigerian food. This necessitates engagement with informal ‘foodwork networks’ to source authentic ingredients. We introduce the concept of ‘integrated intensive’ motherhood, where traditional intensive motherhood practices are modified through necessary reliance on broader networks for cultural foodwork. We contribute to debates surrounding intensive motherhood by challenging its codification as exclusively white and middle class, while also expanding understanding of how migrant mothers negotiate cultural transmission through foodwork practices within dominant societal structures.

Introduction

Intensive motherhood (Hays, 1996) suggests that ‘good’ mothers devote substantial emotional, physical and financial resources to maximise their children’s potential. Despite critiques of its idealised expectations (Brenton, 2017), intensive motherhood remains the dominant cultural framework through which many maternal practices are evaluated (Cappellini et al., 2019), transcending social class and racial boundaries (Elliott et al., 2015).

However, intensive motherhood is predominantly codified as a white middle-class practice (Elliott et al., 2015), and its appropriateness as a lens to explore the practices of ‘other’ mothers is questioned (Rollock et al., 2012; Vincent et al., 2012). This article extends beyond traditional explorations of white intensive motherhood by investigating the parenting practices of first-generation Nigerian mothers in the United Kingdom. In doing so, we contribute to the intensive motherhood literature by exploring the mothering practices of a particular group of ‘Black’ mothers, recognising the inherent problems in treating all ‘Black’ motherhood performances as inherently similar (Hill Collins, 1986).

Drawing on qualitative interviews with first-generation Nigerian mothers living in the UK, we demonstrate how they displayed and followed intensive motherhood practices, which problematises existing research. While previous studies of ‘Black’ motherhood emphasises distinctions from ‘white’ practices – such as integrating extended kinship networks (Dow, 2016) and maintaining cultural authenticity to prepare children for navigating racism (Hill, 1999; Vincent et al., 2012) – our participants demonstrated a nuanced approach. They strategically ‘dialled down’ their cultural expressions, tempering public display of Nigerian cultural practices to facilitate their child’s success within (white dominant) society (Gatwiri and Anderson, 2021).

While our participants fluently practised intensive motherhood ideologies, some of which aligned with Nigerian cultural values (e.g. a strong emphasis on education, success and hard work), they blended elements of ‘integrated motherhood’ (Dow, 2016) by necessity into their foodwork practices (Bove and Sobal, 2006; DeVault, 1991). While publicly conforming to intensive motherhood norms, they preserved and amplified (‘dialling up’) Nigerian cultural values primarily within domestic spaces, notably through the provision of traditional Nigerian cuisine in their transnational family (Reynolds and Zontini, 2014).

Offering children Nigerian meals (e.g. Afang soup, Jollof rice) necessitated additional labour in sourcing and preparing authentic ingredients/recipes. Such foodwork emerged as the primary way our participants transmitted cultural values to their children through a form of cultural umbilical cord. This necessitated their involvement with what we label ‘foodwork networks’; actors who procured/shipped authentic Nigerian foods to the UK, sometimes with unknown credentials/via unofficial channels. We contribute to foodwork literature by demonstrating additional complexity in sourcing authentic ingredients, integral to participants’ private cultural display. We highlight that while our participants predominantly practised intensive motherhood (departing from Nigeria’s community-motherhood approach), they enrolled a modified version of integrated motherhood into foodwork, reliant on others to source Nigerian ingredients. We term this ‘integrated intensive’ motherhood.

Intensive Motherhood Ideology

Intensive motherhood is recognised as a globally pervasive cultural script that surrounds the practice of ‘proper’ and ‘good’ mothering (Kerrane et al., 2021). Intensive motherhood suggests that mothers should prioritise meeting the caregiving needs of their children above all else (Hays, 1996). Although often framed as gender neutral (Shirani et al., 2012), research centres on intensive motherwork, with mothers positioned as ultimately responsible for child rearing and children’s later success (Vincent et al., 2012).

Given the all-encompassing nature of intensive mothering, bound in ‘the day-to-day labor of nurturing the child, listening to the child, attempting to decipher the child’s needs and desires, struggling to meet the child’s wishes, and placing the child’s well-being ahead of their own convenience’ (Hays, 1996: 8), intensive motherhood is often considered incompatible with economic employment (Kerrane at al., 2022). As a practice, it is ‘child-centered, expert-guided, emotionally absorbing, labor-intensive, and financially expensive’ (Hays, 1996: 8), which often results in mothers feeling torn between paid work and home (Lee et al., 2014).

Intensive mothering is viewed as part of a contemporary neoliberal rationality, emphasising individual responsibility, risk management, self-surveillance and control (Shirani et al., 2012). Mothers are reported to feel the need to internalise and display ‘good’ motherhood to others, particularly other women. As a practice, intensive motherhood is inherently middle class, requiring considerable resources (Perrier, 2013), and successful intensive motherhood is linked to rearing future model citizens (Shirani et al., 2012).

‘Black’ Mothers, Integrated Mothering and Intensive Motherhood

Intensive parenting ideology has received criticism for presenting an idealised, yet often unobtainable, depiction of motherhood, which many mothers struggle to follow. Mothers who occupy less privileged positions, particularly those from racialised or minority groups, are found to struggle to actualise intensive motherhood identity (Skeggs, 2004). Mothers who fail to match and display ‘good’ motherhood practices are relegated to ‘bad’ motherhood categorisations for failure to meet such normative standards (Carroll and Yeadon-Lee, 2022), regardless of the structural inequalities they face (Brenton, 2017).

Much uniformity is associated with intensive motherhood, which is pervasively coded as a white middle-class norm (Elliott et al., 2015). Just like low-income and working-class mothers, who are often ‘othered’ for apparent deficiencies in their motherhood practice (Skeggs, 2005; Tyler, 2008), ‘Black’ mothers are not usually associated with ‘good’ mothering (Malcome, 2024). Historically, Black mothers in the Global North have been associated with ‘the primitive or Third World woman’ (Johnson, 2008: 901), and therefore perception of their ability to display ‘good’ motherhood (as informed by western ideology) is problematic, with Black motherhood pathologised (Hamilton, 2016). Even the socially mobile Black middle-class mothers in Rollock et al.’s (2012: 270) study experienced discomfort among their white counterparts, feeling psychologically devalued, marginalised and subjugated through their positionality ‘as an undesirable other’.

Motherhood cannot be explored, however, without acknowledging interlocking contexts (e.g. racial domination/oppression) (Hill Collins, 1994). Departing from the relative privilege of white middle-class intensive motherhood, Black motherhood is underpinned by themes of survivalism. This often necessitates the extra burden of protecting children from racism and inequality (Elliott et al., 2015; Vincent et al., 2012), and empowering children to ‘get on’, to use Bourdieu’s (1990) term, in unequal fields (see Erel and Reynolds, 2018; Hill Collins, 1994). For many Black mothers, this survival is not only existential, but also economic. Many African American and Nigerian mothers, for example, pursue paid employment outside the home to financially support their family, with ‘other mothers’ (fictive kin or extended familial structures) enrolled to meet childcare commitments (Adekoya et al., 2024; Hill Collins, 1994).

Dow (2016, 2019) has shown how middle- and upper-middle-class African American mothers reject intensive mothering ideologies, instead holding themselves accountable to ‘integrated mothering’. This alternative set of norms is underpinned by a shared history and ‘afterlife’ of slavery (Dow, 2016; Hill Collins, 1986), recognising the interlocking nature of oppression and the importance of their own culture. Mothers are expected to work outside the home, be economically self-sufficient and draw on kin/community support. Dow (2016) found that the women preferred to source childcare from ‘the village’ (i.e. family/community) rather than using strangers or private providers, to protect children from experiencing racism.

The racial oppression that many Black mothers have experienced informs their motherhood practice. Hill Collins (1994: 380), for example, discusses the importance of ‘personal sovereignty’ for Black mothers, which involves ‘the struggle to promote the survival of a social structure whose organizational principles represent the notions of family and motherhood different from those of the mainstream’. Black children are taught by mothers how to survive in unequal systems, how to assimilate and ‘get on’, through being taught how to cope with racial oppression, how to challenge racial marginalisation (Hill Collins, 1986, 1994) and negative stereotypes (Lawson, 2018) and how to carefully traverse opposing worlds with different cultural values. For example, extra-curricular activities are often encouraged by ‘good Black’ mothers to challenge the problematic tropes of (dangerous/thuggish) Black youths (Lawson, 2018). Vincent et al. (2012: 434), drawing on Lareau (2003), refer to this as ‘colouring concerted cultivation’, with extra-curricular activities used to develop children’s talents and maintain links with cultural history/identity, helping to ensure that Black children are secure in, and knowledgeable of, their heritage.

Hill (1999) and Lacy (2004) use the terms ‘dual socialisation’ and ‘strategic assimilation’ respectively to acknowledge how many Black mothers maintain authentic links with Black communities, cultures and histories, while equipping their children with the skills needed to succeed in a white-dominated society (Vincent et al., 2012). This can go beyond the private setting of the family, with many Black mothers in the UK engaging in community activities to develop children’s positive sense of self through community work (Reynolds and Erel, 2018), and with migrants often socialising together to revalidate their capitals and social standing in the face of marginalisation (Erel and Ryan, 2019).

With specific reference to the UK, such practices are frequently read as threatening and problematic. Migrant mothers are criticised for transmitting traditional, ethnically specific cultural values, which potentially ‘pollutes’ the reproduction of the nation (Erel et al., 2018), impeding children’s integration and success (Erel and Reynolds, 2018). Despite migrant mothers’ significant contributions to paid labour in the UK, and their nurturance of future generations, they are often cast as deficient outsiders, and ‘othered’ as disruptive. Public and media debates negatively stereotype migrants in the UK as ‘enemies of the state’ given negative associations with violent extremism (e.g. Muslim families), welfare system cheats (e.g. African families) and engagement in criminality (e.g. Caribbean families) (Reynolds and Erel, 2018).

Although ‘Black’ motherhood studies exist (see, for example, Elliott et al., 2015), they highlight two key issues. First, that it is not conducive to apply the lens of intensive motherhood ideology to study ‘Black’ mothers. Norms surrounding parenting, and intensive motherhood, do not centre race (Rollock et al., 2012; Vincent et al., 2012). As such, they often fail to recognise the relative advantage of white middle-class mothers as economically secure, and overlook racial privilege/disadvantage, as other ethnic groups struggle for power (Hill Collins, 1994). The material conditions of structural inequalities and disadvantage affect the ability to display ‘good’ mothering, which may be out of reach for some mothers of colour (Elliott et al., 2015). Second, ‘Black’ motherhood is often treated as generic, suggesting that all Black women share similar standpoints. This fails to acknowledge significant differences in (‘Black’) motherhood experiences, as evident through different class or regional groups. As Hill Collins (1986: s22) recognises, ‘there is no monolithic Black women’s culture’.

Motherhood in Nigeria

Nigeria’s patriarchal culture relegates women to traditional femininity, domesticity and submission (Adekoya et al., 2024). Motherhood, however, remains central to women’s status, with Nigerian mothers transmitting cultural values to their children, which fosters collective well-being, respect for authority, a strong work ethic and traditional gender roles (Ogbemudia, 2023; Oluseye et al., 2024).

Nigeria’s harsh economic climate necessitates dual-income families (Amah, 2021), yet workplaces remain hostile to women’s advancement within the country’s ‘hyper-masculine’ culture. Limited government and employer support means mothers depend on extended family and community networks for child-rearing assistance (Adekoya et al., 2024; Amah, 2021). This community-mothering approach mirrors Dow’s (2016) ‘integrated mothering’, contrasting to individualistic intensive mothering practices (Hays, 1996).

Most mothers in Nigeria, including the educated middle class, embrace or reluctantly acquiesce to societal inequality, fearing the social repercussions of challenging longstanding religious and cultural values. However, a minority refuse such traditionalism (Adekoya et al., 2024), pursuing migration for equality, career progression and capital (Ogbemudia, 2023). Many migrants subsequently seek connection to their homeland through practices like foodwork (Jones, 2019).

Mothering and Foodwork

Feeding the family is one of the key ways women present themselves as ‘good’ mothers (DeVault, 1991), with ‘intensive feeding ideology’ (Brenton, 2017: 863) synonymous with intensive motherhood and its display. Since mothers remain disproportionately involved in family tasks, they are typically responsible for foodwork and are deemed morally accountable for offering food to children. Foodwork is intertwined with classed discourses and displays of ‘proper’ and ‘healthy’ eating (Harman and Cappellini, 2015) and reflects the material, mental and physical labour surrounding meal planning, food shopping and cooking (Bove and Sobal, 2006).

While foodwork is highly labour intensive/mundane, it involves more than the mere provision of sustenance (DeVault, 1991). Feeding the family involves in-depth knowledge of family members’ needs, extensive co-ordination and connectedness to one another, and the maintenance of family culture (DeVault, 1991). For example, mothers must protect their children from illness/allergies via their foodwork (Morlacchi, 2024) with many mothers (e.g. low-income) facing heightened feeding challenges (Parsons et al., 2024).

While foodwork is often positioned as a socially oppressive domestic burden, it offers means to display love and care to children (Parsons et al., 2024). Displays of good mothering are performed through foodwork practices such as cooking from scratch, avoiding highly processed, convenience foods and imparting healthy eating habits to children. Mothers often face judgement and surveillance of foodwork practices, particularly when crossing boundaries between public and private spaces, such as the visible display of providing children food via school lunchboxes (Harman and Cappellini, 2015). Enacted within social and structural relations, foodwork is linked to the reproduction of social class, privileging those with the resources to pursue these moral values (Parsons et al., 2024).

From a cultural perspective, foodwork also offers a pathway to not only perform symbolic displays of love and care, but also to retain cultural heritage through transmitting values intergenerationally (Brenton, 2017), strengthening cultural identity (DeVault, 1991; Kerrane et al., 2023). Food histories and narratives have been identified as the means through which cultural values can be consumed and transferred, with African American children, for example, taking pride in their consumption of ‘soul food’ (despite societal criticism surrounding its nutritional value) as ‘emblematic of “who they are”’ (Jones, 2019: 908).

Ultimately, given questions surrounding whether intensive motherhood is a suitable lens to explore the practices of ‘Black’ mothers; concerns of positioning ‘Black’ motherhood as an all-encompassing concept; and given that foodwork underpins everyday accounts of ‘good’ motherhood, acting as a cultural umbilical cord, we ask: is intensive motherhood a suitable lens to explore the practices of ‘good’ motherhood performed by Nigerian middle-class mothers in the UK? And how does foodwork support their motherhood performances?

Method

We conducted 20 in-depth interviews with Nigerian mothers living in the United Kingdom. Participants were first-generation immigrants and were middle class. While they had successful careers in Nigeria and felt that their middle class-ness was well established, they moved to the UK for economic and lifestyle factors. Their migration was also primarily for educational opportunities for their children and to ensure their child’s social mobility. Participants positioned their child(ren), and their mothering practices, as a future-orientated project, aligning with intensive mothering ideology (Hays, 1996). Participants had successful, professional careers in the UK (e.g. university lecturer, accountant), and each had a male partner. One participant was a full-time self-funded postgraduate student. Since our focus was on motherhood, the male parenting role was not always described by participants, with male partners often receding into the background of their accounts.

Participants were recruited from north-west England, largely via personal contacts and convenience sampling. A smaller number were recruited via snowballing. Participants were aged between 35 and 46 years old and had between one and four children. They were generally university-educated with significant economic/cultural capital, evident through home ownership, business ventures, family holidays, frequent UK–Nigeria travel and the ability to pay for children’s extra-curricular activities. Given paid work commitments, coupled with laborious mothering practices, participants identified as time poor and were difficult to reach.

Interviews were held via Microsoft Teams, and lasted between one and two hours. This format addressed participants’ time constraints and scheduling difficulties given their work and childcare commitments. Several participants commented how a traditional face-to-face interview would have been problematic to arrange.

The interviews were semi-structured and captured broad themes, including why they decided to move to the UK; what ‘good’ motherhood meant to them as Nigerian mothers living in the UK; how/if Nigerian cultural values informed their parenting practices (particularly surrounding foodwork); and any problems they encountered in performing their mothering practices. Participants were free to raise any issues they felt pertinent to explain their mothering performances. Informed by Vincent et al. (2012), the first author, a mother of Nigerian heritage living in the UK, conducted each interview. She was frequently positioned by participants as someone who shared aspects of their lived experiences of Nigerian mothering in the UK. Her familiarity with cultural terms, values and social norms, alongside personal experiences of racialisation and ‘othering’, facilitated the development of rapport and a nuanced understanding of participants’ accounts. This cultural and experiential proximity enriched the data collection and interpretation process. This ‘insider’ perspective was particularly useful to co-authors who did not share the same cultural background and were therefore less attuned to the specific challenges and motivations underpinning participants’ maternal practices. Interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. Participants often used elements of their native Nigerian language/dialect, which we have not corrected in data display to remain faithful to participants’ accounts.

Ethical guidelines were closely followed, with this project holding university ethics board approval. Pseudonyms are used throughout with identifying information removed. Following Braun and Clarke (2006), we conducted an inductive thematic analysis. Each author initially read the transcripts in isolation to familiarise themselves with the data. Notes and memos were exchanged between the team, initially focusing on one participant at a time. Once this stage was complete, the iterative process of searching for themes across the dataset began. Patterns of commonality were noted and refined.

Findings

We present our findings through two interconnected themes. First, we examine how participants enacted ‘good’ motherhood, aligning with Hays’ (1996) intensive motherhood framework. Participants cultivated relationships with ‘suitable’ peers regardless of racial background while strategically moderating public displays of their Nigerianness (‘dialling down’) to minimise their children’s experiences of otherness. Second, we explore how participants transmitted cultural values to children through intensive foodwork practices (‘dialling up’), particularly in preparing traditional Nigerian dishes. While carefully managing public displays of ‘Nigerianness’, participants utilised foodwork within domestic spaces as a cultural umbilical cord, relying on food networks to source authentic ingredients – a practice that parallels elements of Dow’s (2016) integrated motherhood.

‘Good’ Nigerian Motherhood (‘Dialling Down’)

Participants’ accounts of ‘good’ Nigerian motherhood aligned with Hays’ (1996) intensive motherhood and its public display, particularly in ensuring the later success of the developing child. Our affluent middle-class women had financial resources to embrace concerted cultivation (Lareau, 2003) and enrolled their children in many extra-curricular activities (e.g. sports-based/private tuition), which placed time burdens on their family (and the mothers, in particular, who assumed much of the additional labour in taking children to/from such organised activities). This aspect of child-focused intensive motherhood was particularly visible, with participants explaining how their move to the UK was often motivated by giving their children the best start in life, underpinned by UK schooling:

Even our choice of where to live was entirely determined by schools and schooling and excellence. Education says everything that is as us, outside of spiritual and character development, that is a, the top priority in their life. So, academic excellence is non-negotiable. It is it. . . They don’t have any other purpose in life. Please, God, and pass your, your school. (Deborah)

Participants described how ‘good’ Nigerian parenting practices often had religious connotations and significance – with children being a ‘gift from God’ that they needed to optimally nurture and develop. Deborah further explains:

Nigerians are naturally competitive. Naturally, achievements and excellence is just part and parcel of being a Nigerian, so that we are in the mainstream of that culture. So that’s just, you know. And I think, I think you know what, if you can do it, why not? If God has given you the ability, it’s your responsibility to, to use it, to the, to the absolute best that you can. . . And then it’s our job to enable that and to, you know, create, give you the resources and the tools and the skills, you know and all of that.

In following elements of Nigerian values in the UK (e.g. a focus on educational attainment; discipline), the women wanted to offer their child(ren) the best possible start in life, and, as ‘good’ mothers, they wanted to offer the advantages of both worlds (Nigerian/UK) to their children:

So, I’m trying to get them [children] to listen. . . you’ve got two identities, but you want the best of both worlds from them. . . You, you want the best of what Britain has to offer, and you want the best of the Nigerian culture instilled in them at the same time. (Carol)

For many, this meant ensuring that their child(ren) socialised with suitable others. While this did not necessarily mean ‘white’ or exclusively with fellow Nigerians, participants encouraged their children to socialise with the children they perceived as having societal advantage (e.g. the educational high achievers; children whose parents had admirable careers and social standing). The women deliberately sought out successful others that their children should socialise with (e.g. by ensuring their children attended after-school, paid-for, extra-curricular activities to ‘encourage’ what they deemed as appropriate friendships), and did not feel the need for their children to solely socialise with those who shared their racial and cultural heritage.

Our participants described how race receded into the background of elements of their ‘good’ intensive motherhood practices, with success (rather than racialised similarities) promoted and sought out among their child’s friendship groups. Such socialisation with those beyond their ethnic group was deemed important given negative stereotypes surrounding ‘Blackness’ (Vincent et al., 2012). While other research, however, highlights the importance immigrants often place in maintaining social ties with those of a shared cultural/racial background (Montgomery, 2006; Vincent et al., 2012), this did not appear as prominently among our sample. Although this was often explained by participants as exposing their children to multi-cultural, diverse Britain, several participants foreground a desire for their children to associate with ‘white’ others in a bid for their children to strategically assimilate:

I’ll say for the last six to seven years we’ve intentionally attended a predominantly Indigenous church, like a white church, because I feel that a lot of times, we don’t take time to understand our communities. We don’t take time to understand people, and if we stay in our own sort of bubble, then that’s when you have a lot of misunderstanding. (Jennifer)

The ‘misunderstanding’ that participants alluded to referenced problems with social homophily. Participants recognised the risk of staying in a cultural ‘bubble’ and of remaining insular, which could potentially lead to division due to a lack of integration.

In addition, participants also referred to the stigma and negative connotations they felt surrounded their Nigerian heritage and cultural values. While admirable elements of Nigerian culture were maintained and instilled in their children (e.g. discipline, a strong work ethic), other elements were often ‘dialled down’. The mothers frequently explained negative stereotypes they felt positioned Nigerians as corrupt, excessively loud, exuberant/flamboyant and brash. These were elements of Nigerian culture that our participants purposefully distanced themselves, and their children, from:

There are aspects of Nigerian culture that we navigate away from. . . I would say like big parties, you know, flashy parties, flashy dressing. Kind of very flashy fashion and, sadly, these days that also includes like artificial hair for women and, you know. Like we wouldn’t, for instance, you know, like a lot of Nigerians might feel that celebrating every birthday in a big way is a priority. You know, like, you know, if all the, with all the pulling out all the stops. You know, renting halls to having this elaborate makeup and very, very expensive clothing and inviting lots of people and having this kind of really big gathering, and things like that. (Deborah)

While participants were proud of elements of their Nigerian heritage, display of their cultural values took place largely within the privacy of the home or to select, like-minded others (e.g. their church friends). The women recalled a delicate management of public/private display surrounding their and their children’s ‘Nigerianness’. Lovely, for example, recalled her son’s fourth birthday party, and described a separation between who could see the authentic, Nigerian gathering, and those who could not:

My son had a party. He turned four and honestly, I wouldn’t lie to you. I didn’t invite many people from his class because I was like, would they understand what’s going on in my home? The loud Nigerian music, jollof rice, the fried plantain, you understand. Nigerians are very loud. And I’m like, would they understand? So, you know, I just picked my regular Black friends that I know they have kids, bring them. And a friend of mine was like, why didn’t you invite this person from his class? What? I said no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Lovely’s positioning of the similarities between her and the Nigerian first author recognises elements of Nigerian culture that participants felt non-Nigerians may experience as ‘different’ and difficult to appreciate (‘you understand’). Such difference was largely kept secret to outsiders and was more usually visible to other Nigerian friends/family alone. The tendency to ‘dial down’ such cultural expression was most prominent among recent immigrants, like Lovely (who had been in the UK for just one year). The Nigerian mothers who had lived in the UK for longer periods felt more comfortable in revealing glimpses of their Nigerian culture to outsiders, particularly those they regarded as ‘safe’ and non-judgemental. Deborah, for example, discussed bringing ‘accessible’ home-cooked Nigerian cuisine to a local church event that celebrated cultural diversity, which she modified to accommodate ‘white’ palates:

The church is diverse, but obviously, there’s mostly white, white people. . . everyone was able to bring something to share. We made, we took fried plantain, dodo. . . this is a very accessible part of our cuisine, a very accessible dish. There’s no pepper in it. There’s no spice in it. There’s nothing.

Participants were, however, not keen to widely display elements of their cultural heritage to others (e.g. white friends/colleagues) for concern that their social standing, or that of their child, may be tainted if their Nigerianness was more prominently displayed. As other research demonstrates, ‘Black’ children are often subtly positioned as inferior within white-dominated society (Gatwiri and Anderson, 2021; Vincent et al., 2012), so visible displays of cultural ‘difference’ (e.g. allowing others into their home; wearing traditional Nigerian clothing at non-Nigerian gatherings) was largely avoided:

The other day I told him, because I make packed lunches to school, and I didn’t know what to cook. I said, ‘John, should I give you Semo [traditional Nigerian staple] to school?’ He looked just like ‘Mommy, I think they’ll laugh at me’. . . so I made him something different. (Lovely)

As John’s experience highlights, children were reportedly particularly conscious of standing out among their peers. What could be read as a ‘good’ intensive motherhood performance by Lovely (i.e. providing a healthy, home-cooked packed lunch) (Harman and Cappellini, 2015) simultaneously had potential to yield negative affordances (i.e. exposing John to questions or ridicule through the ‘different’ food consumed).

While skin colour was often an obvious and visible marker of difference among the successful middle-class circles in which they immersed their children, participants explained how any additional markers of difference (and its display to others) were carefully managed. While not explicitly explained in racist terms, participants discussed how it was often easier to cloak elements of their culture, rather than to explain their significance or importance to others. In doing so, we believe that participants may have sought to shield their children from potential bullying, which we acknowledge could have racist undertones. Our participants, however, surprisingly downplayed the everyday racism that they/their child may have encountered, and did not explicitly link the invisibility of their cultural displays to fear of racism. Instead, they foreground enabling their children to ‘fit in’ in mainstream (read white) UK culture to ensure their success, which they felt necessitated concealing elements of cultural difference.

Concealing elements of their culture from ‘others’, and only allowing a select few (e.g. those with lived experience of immigration, other ‘Black Mums’) into the privacy of their home, where cultural values (particularly surrounding food) were more freely displayed, filtered through to their children. This ‘dialling down’ of their culture and its managed display was explained by Deborah, who described how her daughter (Joanna) was struggling with how much of her authentic, Nigerian identity to display to her peers:

You know, she struggles a little bit because she’s still questioning how much of her Nigerianness she has to give up, because she really wants to be accepted within the society. . . So, it’s a little bit different for her and she still struggles with that. You know, she still wonders. . . if we’re less Nigerian, would we be more English? If we’re less Nigerian, we would be more accepted? . . . Is it because I’m Nigerian? And if I take away that aspect of myself, will I then be accepted?

For Joanna, the perceived difference of being a Nigerian in the UK manifests in what were considered the best ways to assimilate. Most of our mothers, for example, discussed how key (visible) markers of their authentic Nigerian culture (e.g. dress, language, food) were purposefully ‘dialled down’ to ensure that they (and more importantly, their children) could more easily fit in with everyday UK society (with Nigerian dress, for example, only displayed at key cultural events, among other Nigerians; and local Nigerian languages were largely not spoken, even within the home).

However, while our participants explained how they ‘dialled down’ elements of their display of Nigerian culture, to downplay or protect their children from racism, stigma and difference, they explained how one element of Nigerian culture (food) was ‘dialled up’, albeit through private display and consumption within the home.

Foodwork and Private Display (‘Dialling Up’)

Whereas public display of Nigerianness to those beyond the family was largely hidden, with participants conscious that ‘difference’ could transmute into discrimination and disadvantage given racialised inequalities many ‘Black’ children in the UK encounter (Vincent et al., 2012), private display of Nigerian culture was obvious. Although traditional dress and language did not feature prominently in our participants’ accounts, the women foreground the importance of providing authentic, Nigerian food to their children; ‘dialling up’ this element of Nigerian culture. Such foodwork and concomitant consumption acted as a route to teach children about Nigerian culture and distant family members, albeit within the relative privacy of the home. In offering their children Nigerian food, participants faced significant, additional foodwork labour in sourcing ingredients and performing laborious food preparations, adding an additional layer of complexity to traditional foodwork categories (DeVault, 1991). While this extended foodwork was expensive (both financially and temporally), participants were committed to providing Nigerian food to their children, keeping their culture alive.

While offering traditional Nigerian dishes to their children acted as a form of cultural umbilical cord, the women revealed an ulterior motive for doing so. As the first theme of our findings suggests, participants wanted their children to have ‘the best of both worlds’. Conscious that their children regularly visited Nigeria and extended family members, reflecting features of the transnational family (see Reynolds and Zontinni, 2014), participants exposed their children to spicy foods to develop their fluency with Nigerian dishes and tastes. They felt that this was particularly important so that their children, and themselves, did not face any embarrassment among their Nigerian peers should the Nigerian palate not be developed. Ella explained:

I tell my son, but just to make sure that you know this is, you have this culture in you. This is how we eat. So that’s another thing that I try to put in him as well. And in terms of that, I cook some Ijaw delicacy for him as well. Make sure he’s used to it.

Participants explained how their children would ‘lose face’, should they not be able to consume spicy dishes synonymous with traditional Nigerian cuisine. Through ensuring that their children were cognisant of the Nigerian culinary palate, the women protected their children from being labelled ‘Oyinbo’ by fellow Nigerians (a derogatory term used to describe someone who has lost their cultural African values/has become too westernised). Such practices also helped participants to secure their standing as a ‘good’ Nigerian mother – teaching their children how to be ‘Nigerian’ among similar others. Favour explains:

I’m intentional about pepper, so we really use Scotch bonnet. She needs to eat pepper. . . The food here can be very bland. British people don’t like to eat pepper. Pepper is hot, you know. So, I don’t want her to say that it’s hot because we will visit Nigeria and you eat pepper soup. . . So, I don’t want her to be picky. I want her to continue to eat the Nigerian palate. . . I’m very intentional about food.

Participants recognised, however, that western foods were often quicker and easier to prepare and sometimes featured on their dinner table. While convenient, they perceived such meals as lacking the cultural significance and nutritious value they associated with authentic, Nigerian food (which they cooked three to four times per week). Hence, the women went to great lengths to ensure that Nigerian dishes were regularly offered to their children, positioning Nigerian food (despite complexities in its preparation) as superior to western offerings to nourish the developing child:

I feel like that stuff [British food] is a little bit processed, you know, it’s pre-processed. And I just kind of feel like, you know, having, just combining that kind of slightly processed diet with Nigerian cuisine, which is like everything cooked from scratch. So, if it’s quite wholesome, I feel like it just gives them a healthier diet. So, the non-Nigerian food I feel is almost supplementary. (Deborah)

Evelyn, however, was the exception. Evelyn regarded the expense (both financial and time-based) of procuring specialist ingredients as a burden that she was happy to shed – choosing, instead, to offer her child predominantly western foods:

What is the budget of the house you want to live in? Can you afford it? Do you understand you’re thinking about all those things and thinking is the location of the African shop as important? . . . You know, there is no way in the Bible where it says they have to eat Afang and okra every week. . . So, I have freed myself, you know, over time from that burden. I call it a burden, you know.

For most of our participants, however, cooking from scratch and sourcing authentic Nigerian ingredients was of upmost importance. They explained how they would travel from store-to-store to procure needed items, despite being time poor, having highly successful careers and their involvement (as discussed earlier) with their children’s extra-curricular activities: ‘some of our shopping has also done like not locally, but there’s a store. It’s probably about, it’s about 30 minutes away, so it’s probably about 30 minutes drive away’ (Janet). Given the importance of Nigerian food to most participants (and how they use food as one of the remaining ways to maintain connections with their Nigerian culture/family members), it was non-negotiable that they would exert such time/effort:

I think food just defines everybody, doesn’t it? Food is such because I think food brings memories. It brings memories of happy memories, childhood memories. So yeah. I think it will always be hard to do away with food, even if you assimilate other aspects of a culture. (Favour)

Participants found themselves using what we term ‘food networks’ to obtain needed ingredients (e.g. palm oil or Gari – a granular flour made from fermented cassava roots, a staple food in West Africa) to ensure their provision of authentic Nigerian dishes. Whereas the women appeared self-sufficient in most mothering practices (e.g. taking sole responsibility for childcare, taking children to/from after-school enrichment classes), they recognised the need for help in obtaining Nigerian food staples. Although they had found specific stores in the UK to obtain Nigerian produce, some upwards of an hour drive away from home, they recognised limitations on availability. It was common practice for the women to turn to friends/family members travelling into the UK from Nigeria and ask them to import needed items, sharing similarities to the support networks Dow (2016) identifies in integrated motherhood. Participants’ mothers (based in Nigeria) were frequently tasked with procuring and importing needed items. They explained how their mother ensured quality standards were maintained, and how their mother’s efforts became entwined in the food that they in turn offered to their children:

My mum, till tomorrow, if I need her to bring anything for me from Nigeria, should say tell me where and what time to give me enough time to prepare. So, she will go to the market to buy the pepper, dried pepper. She would wash it and dry it out without fly perching on it, without dust getting on it. And she would grind it. . . she would prepare it by hand. (Ladi)

Symbolically, this movement of ingredients from different continents, and between different generations, heightened the significance of the food that was later prepared and consumed, imbued with authentic cultural values (e.g. the elaborate practices surrounding securing, drying and packaging ingredients signalled the importance of keeping cultural heritage alive, and the significance of family bonds and foodwork preparations that underpinned such cultural transfers). These foodwork acts highlight an important mechanism through which transnational families (comprising family members dispersed across national borders) maintained family relationships and cultural values (Jones, 2019), despite geographical distance. Ladi’s quote, above, illustrates the love and intimacy imbued with foodwork practices, which worked as an emotional bridge to distant family members, and helped to re-restore a feeling of connection to absent family members (Reynolds and Zontini, 2014). Whereas our participants did not feel the need to establish links with fellow Nigerians in the UK, they were keen to maintain connections with families/friends in Nigeria, maintaining strong transnational networks.

Where friends/family members were not available to help source needed ingredients, participants turned, instead, to more informal, and underground elements of their food network (which they referred to as ‘shippers’), often placing orders through professional strangers with unverified (and largely unauthorised) credentials. Participants grappled with this element of their foodwork. Engaging with the black market, which they mostly recognised was a largely harmless and minor offence, did, however, risk jeopardising their standing as ‘good’ intensive mothers, and maintaining the moral standards this entailed (Hays, 1996). Nevertheless, they rendered such moral transgressions as necessary, such was the importance of providing authentic, Nigerian meals to their children (given that this was one of the last markers of their cultural display, albeit within the relative anonymity of the home).

Discussion

Existing studies of intensive motherhood tend to focus on how white mothers (attempt to) adhere to intensive mothering ideology. Our article addresses an important gap by exploring, instead, intensive motherhood among a group of Nigerian mothers living in the UK. We demonstrate how tenets of ‘good’ intensive motherhood (i.e. child-centric activities, self-sacrifice, highly labour-intensive practices, particularly surrounding foodwork) are firmly displayed by our participants as they work to develop the potential of their children and their later success.

Although intensive motherhood is often criticised for being an inappropriate lens to explore ‘Black’ mothering practices, since it does not centre race, is codified as a ‘white’ practice and ignores racialised inequalities, we find, however, that our sample of middle-class Nigerian mothers in the UK embraced intensive motherhood principles. Intensive motherhood, and fostering children’s competitive advantage, was described by participants as reflective of elements of Nigerian culture. However, intensive motherhood’s individualistic orientation differed from the more common communal ‘integrated motherhood’ (Dow, 2016), widely practised in Nigeria (Adekoya et al., 2024).

While our sample demonstrated intensive motherhood practices, they simultaneously felt the need, however, to carefully manage display of their (and their child’s) Nigerianness (‘dialling down’). They considered this necessary to allow their child to ‘get on’, and to overcome their sense of difference within UK society (which privileges whiteness). While participants outwardly displayed ‘good’ intensive motherhood, in ways similar to many white middle-class mothers through ‘good’ motherhood practices (e.g. enrolling children in extra-curricular activities; viewing the child as a project to be managed), they felt it necessary to carefully manage display of their Nigerianness, concerned that their children could be stigmatised given negative perceptions they felt surrounded Nigerian culture (e.g. corruption; exuberance). This carefully managed display across different contexts, in turn, emerged as an important feature of their intensive motherhood practices (i.e. ‘dialling down’ their Nigerian cultural values was positioned as being child-focused, to ensure they could thrive in UK society). Within the privacy of the home, however, foodwork emerged as an important pathway to keep traditional, Nigerian cultural values alive (‘dialling up’) as part of a transnational family (Reynolds and Zontini, 2014).

We make several contributions to the intensive motherhood literature. First, we demonstrate that intensive motherhood can provide a pertinent lens to understand experiences of ‘Black’ mothering – illustrated by our sample of middle-class Nigerian mothers in the UK. While existing research with ‘Black’ mothers often centres on low-income or upwardly mobile women, our participants felt firmly cemented in the middle classes (both in the UK, and in terms of their family’s earlier origins/heritage in Nigeria). As such, despite pockets of racial inequalities they encountered (but downplayed), they were a relatively privileged group (e.g. they maintained successful careers, were university educated and had considerable economic and cultural capital). Their relative privilege eased their ability to display (and maintain the practices surrounding) intensive motherhood, particularly relating to developing the child’s competitive advantage. Unlike research with other ‘Black’ mothers, our participants did not feel as compelled to maintain links with Nigerian others in the UK and felt secure in their middle-class standing (Rollock et al., 2012; Vincent et al., 2012). They prioritised success for their child(ren) through any means necessary, and purposefully pursued opportunities to integrate (e.g. attending ‘white church’), which reduced their concerns surrounding risk of separation/isolation.

Second, and perhaps different from ‘white’ intensive motherhood practices, we reveal an additional tranche of labour performed by our sample surrounding public/private display. Whereas intensive motherhood is often understood as a highly visible practice, our findings demonstrate how elements of ‘good’ intensive motherhood were often rendered purposefully invisible. In our context, participants felt strongly that their cultural heritage should be transmitted to their children, and they looked for ways to do this (via foodwork) in subtle/less visible ways. Food, consumed in the relative privacy of the home, emerged as a ‘safe’ vehicle to transmit cultural values intergenerationally. In downplaying other visible makers of cultural differences (e.g. dress, language) we recognise how participants may have regarded authentic Nigerian practices as potentially less legitimate among mainstream (read white) UK parenting practices. Specific explorations of ‘non-white’ parenting approaches are, despite multi-cultural Britain, relatively rare. This could help to explain why our participants felt the need to ‘dial down’ elements of their Nigerian culture, for fear that visible display of their ‘otherness’ could position their child as ‘different’ within a society that often privileges whiteness (Gatwiri and Anderson, 2021).

Third, we contribute to both intensive motherhood and foodwork by demonstrating the efforts that our Nigerian mothers went to in procuring authentic ingredients that were integral to their cultural transfers and private display via feeding their family (‘dialling up’). This extends the mere sourcing of ingredients via local shops and demonstrates a far-reaching range of additional activities (e.g. extensive travel, engaging with illegal black market food networks) that existing foodwork categories do not as comprehensively consider. We also show how our participants blended intensive mothering through a form of modified integrated mothering. While our participants were largely self-sufficient and successfully adept at practising intensive motherhood, they needed help (via food networks) to ensure authentic, Nigerian dishes could be offered to their children. Here, we demonstrate a blending of intensive and integrated motherhood, which we label ‘integrated intensive’ (which resonates with participants’ accounts of offering their children the best of both Nigerian and UK worlds/values).

Finally, we illustrate the complexities surrounding the label ‘Black mothers’. As Hill Collins (1986) demonstrates, there is no such monolithic concept of the shared lived experience of ‘Black’ mothers. Considerable differences in the lived experience of motherhoods are obvious. While we agree that many ‘Black’ mothers likely encounter everyday racism, and struggle to enact intensive motherhood practices through racialised or classed inequalities, our participants emerged as a relatively privileged group and did not centre racism in their accounts. They were highly successful, educated women, who very much self-identified as middle class, and displayed many aspects of intensive motherhood. As such, we recognise the potential uniqueness of our sample/their positioning and suggest that the all-encompassing label of ‘Black’ motherhood is not helpful to explain nuances and differences in the plethora of ways that such mothers perform motherhood.