Comer and Poussaint’s manual answers nearly 1,000 child-rearing questions they’ve heard repeatedly from black parents across the social-economic spectrum. Comer teaches psychiatry at the Yale Child Study Center. He’s spent more than two decades working with inner-city public schools. Poussaint teaches at Harvard Medical School and was a consultant to “The Cosby Show.” Their guidelines for how black families might deal with some common-and perplexing-issues:
When a black child comes home from an integrated setting and says, “I’m white,” his parents may be surprised. The book suggests saying, “No, you are black like Mommy (or Daddy).” If the child offers his lightskinned arm or hand as evidence of his whiteness, parents can explain that “black” is the name of a group of people, and that color within the group ranges from white to black. Interracial couples who talk candidly about their relationship and black-white relations in general can assure their children that it’s possible to be black and white and OK.
Ages 9 through 12 are crucial developmental years for all children. Basic attitudes, values and strategies for handling problems in life-including racial attitudes-develop and become a permanent part of the personality. Youngsters learn to deal with racism by closely watching how adults respond to problems. The authors counsel confronting racism without becoming obsessed with it; the point is for the child to keep functioning even in the face of bigotry.
If a child has been insulted with a racial epithet, the authors suggest that a parent point out that some people call blacks names to make them feel bad. Explain that the child is not the name he was called and that Mommy or Daddy feels good about being black. Adults can help adolescents develop effective ways to fight injustice, such as complaining to an offensive salesclerk’s supervisor or working through the NAACP to force the police to be more sensitive. Parents must also help learn to take responsibility for their own behavior instead of blaming every problem on racism.
Many inner-city blacks are desperate to stop the violence among youths in their neighborhoods. “The way we raise our children from the beginning and the way we teach them to handle anger, conflict, and frustration will help most,” Comer and Poussaint write. The development of inner control, direction and motivation begins with the way an infant is taught to wait for a bottle or stop taking the toy from the boy next door. Spanking teaches the child that violence is the preferred way to show anger and release frustration. Instead, the psychiatrists suggest that parents use other methods, such as explaining to children why certain behavior is unacceptable. (This is good advice for parents of all races, the authors say.) If a young child is in the middle of a tantrum, call a “timeout.” Set clear limits and rules and explain that meeting these expectations will benefit the child, not the parent.
Raising their offspring to function as solid citizens can be problematic for some black parents, Comer and Poussaint write, when they lack their own sense of belonging in society. This can make blacks ambivalent about whether to teach their children the ways, rituals and even values of “the mainstream,” which they view as white middle class. The psychiatrists suggest that many (but not all) of the books read to black preschoolers should be about black children to help give them a sense of their identity and importance in the world. They also advise using multicultural books that depict black, brown, yellow, red and white children to help a child understand that people are different-and that’s fine.
Whether or not to join in society’s rituals, such as saluting the flag (which Black Muslim children don’t do), is a more complicated matter. Rituals give a person or group a sense of belonging, purpose and value in the larger society. If a child does not say the pledge in school, say the authors, parents must give him extra support in case there is a hostile reaction from other children or teachers. They can involve the child in some other kind of ritual such as a pledge to humanity or community. “You’ve got to make mainstream institutions work as they should,” says Comer. In the likely event that that fails to happen, the psychiatrists believe, children must be taught that they can still thrive.
