Format: Book

Target Audience: Black fathers, professionals

Description: In this book, written by a professor of sociology, contemporary black live-away fathers talk about their goals, walk readers through their workplaces, allow readers to meet their families and children, and enable readers to view the world of parenthood through their eyes.  The author interviewed 88 men who do not live with their children, and it is the stories of these men which make up the book.  Part 1 explores the cultural elements that encompass men's lives.  Part 2 looks at what significant others expect of men as fathers and how they behave under these circumstances.  Part 3 analyzes the particular parenting roles and functions of fathers, using narratives of individual men to tell the stories.

• My organization uses this book with our fathers' rites of passage parenting classes, as it helps to dispel some of the myths attached to African-American men and fathers.
• It is truly helpful in raising awareness and enhancing fathers' self-esteem.
• One of the most important factors is that the writer took time to research and interview actual subjects to gain insight and knowledge.
• It allows the reader opportunities to look at his/her role from another perspective.
• Discusses alternative methods of discipline.
• Discusses the role of live-away fathers as well as the extended family.
• Provides bibliography and index.
• I thought the author did terrific fact-finding research on this subject.
• I have a 23-year-old son who is a single father.  When I leave here I am buying this book for him.
• This book makes you think.  It shows various angles of being a father who does not live with his children.
• It seems the author put a lot of time and effort into dispatching what is the "truth" and what people are led to believe about black fathers who live away from their kids.  
• I love what she had to say about the history of black men, and how she follows up with the present.
• This book talks the language I feel all black people can understand.
• The book tries to explain why and how black men feel about their relationships with their children.  Black men who do not have healthy relationships with their children would benefit from this book.
• The book appears to be scholarly and in line with research.
• The section on fatherhood and slavery was particularly interesting.

ISBN: 0-231-11555-5

Copyright Date: 2001

Publisher Information:
Columbia University Press
New York, NY

Cost: $22.50