The Chicago Tribune recently shared LaShawnDa's book "Grandmothering While Black: A Twenty-First Century Story of Love, Coercion, and Survival" in an article yesterday, detailing some of the content and providing information about her background, which has led to her work through her thesis and speaking with policymakers. In her book, Pittman, an associate professor of American Ethnic Studies at the University of Washington in Seattle, plumbs the nuances of the role of contemporary Black grandmothers in today’s landscape.
Raised in a family where her grandparents provided assistance to her immediate family, Pittman became interested in Black women and resilience as a graduate student at Northwestern. It was there that Pittman produced a thesis on Black women and their psychological well-being, and another work on the social capital of children in poverty. All of it revolved around Black grandmothers raising grandchildren. Pittman found her purpose in making sense of the grandmothers’ perspectives, which eventually led to the book.
Pittman has spoken to policymakers around the nation to say: “Here are the resources that we say are available to these families, very few, and yet there are still all these barriers that they’re experiencing.” She hopes her book highlights the travails Black grandmothers face. It’s a written charge for those in positions of power to think about the training of front-line workers who interact with these families.
Read the full article from the Chicago Tribune here.