Dominant depictions of Black families in US scholarship and political discourse have been negative; tropes of defunct, hyper-masculinized men and welfare queens along with a general ‘tangle of pathology’ indictment are common. This article supports other scholarship, which challenges these depictions and acknowledges common positive traits associated with Black families. Through an examination of interviews with 39 famous Black leaders from the US Civil Rights Era coupled with an extant review of sociological Black family literature, this article highlights three positive, supportive traits common to Black families: (1) extended and fictive kin; (2) racial socialization; and (3) education. These findings challenge the assertion of the Black family as dysfunctional by highlighting multiple Black family voices. The analysis relies upon Black families’ articulations of their cultural strengths and successes, which contrasts with the prevailing review of Black families that uses structural approaches and a rigid, White family model.
Alba R., Logan J. and Stults B. ( 2000) How segregated are middle-class African Americans? Social Problems47(4): 543-558.
2.
Benjamin L. ( 2007) Three Black generations at the crossroads. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
3.
Billingsley A. ( 1992) Climbing Jacob’s Ladder. New York: Simon and Schuster.
4.
Bonilla-Silva E. ( 2006) Racism Without Racists, 2nd edition. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
5.
Chatters L., Taylor R. and Jayakody R. ( 1994) Fictive kinship relations in Black extended families. Journal of Comparative Family Studies25(3): 297-312.
6.
Coard S. and Sellers R. ( 2005) African American families as a context for racial socialization . In: McLoyd V, Hill N and Dodge K (eds) African American Family Life. New York: The Guilford Press, 264-284.
7.
Davis AY ( 1981) Women, Race, and Class. New York: Random House.
8.
Feagin J. ( 2006) Systemic Racism: A Theory of Oppression. New York: Routledge.
9.
Feagin J. and McKinney K. ( 2003) The Many Costs of Racism. Lanham, MD : Rowman & Littlefield.
10.
Frazier EF ( 1939) The Negro Family in the United States. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
11.
Furstenberg F. ( 2007) The making of the Black family: Race and class in qualitative studies in the twentieth century. Annual Review of Sociology33: 429-448.
12.
Giddings PJ ( 2001) When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race and Sex in America. New York: HarperCollins .
13.
Gilens M. ( 1999) Why Americans Hate Welfare: Race, Media, and the Politics of Antipoverty Policy. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
14.
Gutman H. ( 1976) The Black Family in Slavery and Freedom: 1750-1925. New York: Random House.
15.
Hacker A. ( 1992) Two Nations: Black and White, Separate, Hostile, Unequal . New York: Macmillan.
16.
Hays S. ( 2003) Flat Broke with Children: Women in the Age of Welfare Reform. New York: Oxford University Press.
17.
Herndon M. and Hirt J. ( 2004) Black students and their families: What leads to success in college. Journal of Black Studies34(4): 489-513.
18.
Hill RB ( 1999) The Strengths of African American Families. Lanham, MD: University Press of America.
19.
Hill S. ( 2001) Class, race, and gender dimensions of child rearing in AfricanAmerican families. Journal of Black Studies31(4): 494-508.
20.
Hill S. ( 2005) Black Intimacies. Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press.
21.
Hill S. and Sprague J. ( 1999) Parenting in Black and White families: The interaction of gender with race and class. Gender and Society13(4): 480-502.
22.
hooks b (1998) Revolutionary parenting. In: Hansen K and Garey A (eds) Families in the US: Kinship and Domestic Policies. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 587-596.
23.
Hymowitz KS ( 2005) The Black family: 40 years of lies. City Journal. Summer. Available at: http://www.city-journal.org/html/15_3_black_family.html .
24.
Hughey M.(2009) Cinethetic racism: White redemption and Black stereotypes in ‘magical negro’ films. Social Problems56(3): 543-577.
25.
Johnson LB and Staples R. ( 2005) Black Families at the Crossroads: Challenges and Prospects . San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass .
26.
Kubrin CE ( 2005) Gangstas, thugs, and hustlas: Identity and the code of the street in rap music. Social Problems52(3): 360-378.
27.
Kuo D. ( 2006) Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction . New York: Free Press.
28.
Lacy K. ( 2007) Blue-Chip Black: Race, Class, and Status in the New Black Middle Class. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
29.
Leffler P. and Bond J. (dirs) (n.d.) Explorations in Black Leadership. Available at: www.virginia.edu/publichistory/bl/index.php.
30.
Lombard M., Snyder-Duchand J. and Bracken CC ( 2002) Content analysis in mass communication: Assessment and reporting of intercoder reliability. Human Communication Research28: 587-604.
31.
Martin E. and Martin JM ( 1978) The Black Extended Family. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
32.
Martin PP and McAdoo HP ( 2007) Sources of racial socialization: Theological orientation of African American churches and parents. In: McAdoo HP (ed.) Black Families, 4th edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage , 124-142.
33.
McAdoo HP (ed.) (2007) Black Families, 4th edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
34.
Moynihan DP ( 1965) The Negro Family: The Case for National Action. Washington, DC: Office of Policy Planning and Research .
35.
Nobles W. ( 2007) African American family life: An instrument of culture . In: McAdoo HP (ed.) Black Families, 4th edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 69-79.
36.
Office of Supplied Studies. (2007) The NSDUH Report: Illicit Drug Use, by Race/Ethnicity, in Metropolitan and Non-Metropolitan Counties: 2004 and 2005. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Available at: www.oas.samhsa.gov/2k7/popDensity/popDensity.htm.
37.
Oliver M. and Shapiro T. ( 2006) Black Wealth/White Wealth: A New Perspective on Racial Inequality. New York: Routledge .
38.
Pattillo-McCoy M. ( 1999) Black Picket Fences. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
39.
Savage C. ( 2001) ‘Because we did more with less’: The agency of African American teachers in Franklin, Tennessee: 1890-1967. Peabody Journal of Education76(2): 170-203.
40.
Siddle Walker V. ( 2000) Valued segregated schools for African American children in the South, 1935-1969: A review of common characteristics and themes. Review of Educational Research70(3): 253-285.
41.
Stack C. ( 1974) All Our Kin. New York: Basic Books.
42.
Strauss AL and Corbin JM ( 1998) Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures for Developing Grounded Theory, 2nd edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
43.
Sudarkasa N. ( 1975) An exposition on the value premises underlying Black family studies. Journal of the National Medical Association67(3): 235-239.
44.
Sudarkasa N. ( 1988) Interpreting the African heritage in Afro-American family organization. In: McAdoo HP (ed.) Black Families, 2nd edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 27-43.
45.
US Census. (2007) The American community - Blacks: 2004. American Community Survey Reports, US Department of Commerce, Economics and Statistics Administration.
46.
US Department of Health and Human Services. ( 2008) Child Maltreatment 2006: Summary of Key Findings. Child Welfare Information Gateway. Available at: www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/cb/pubs/cm06/summary.htm.
47.
Wilson WJ ( 1978) The Declining Significance of Race. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
48.
Wilson WJ ( 1987) The Truly Disadvantaged. Chicago, IL : University of Chicago Press.
49.
Willie CV ( 1988) A New Look at Black Families, 3rd edition. Dix Hills, NY: General Hall.
50.
Winant H. ( 2004) The New Politics of Race. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
