Language, Identity, and Choice by Anderson Kami J.;

Author:Anderson, Kami J.;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: undefined
Publisher: Lexington Books
Published: 2012-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Collective Identity and the Black Family

The general discussion of collective identity provides a foundation for understanding family identity, however it is also important to note the unique traits inherent in the African American family. Coming back to Ogbu’s discussion, he argues the collective identity of oppressed peoples is identified by two factors, “status problems and minority response to status problems” (Ogbu, 2004, p. 4). Arguably, the African American family faces a set of challenges that have been historically defined as forms of oppression. For example, Ogbu argues there are distinct markers in the sociocultural history of Black Americans where status problems first emerged. These status problems have features which are representative of the historical conditions of the Blacks living in America at specific moments in African American history which contribute to the Black consciousness of individuals. He further explains there are four major status problems that make it “difficult if not impossible to solve within the existing system of majority-minority relations” (p. 4). These are the issues of concern among Black Americans that distinguish them as being a distinct segment of United States society and set them apart from the rest of the population. The four status problems discussed are: 1) involuntary incorporation into society, when society controls how a group exists within it; 2) instrumental discrimination, such as micro-aggressions on a group; 3) social subordination, for example assumed criminalization; and 4) expressive mistreatment, such as extreme aggressions like racist attacks (p. 4). These four factors have a specific sociohistorical significance to the way Blacks identify themselves in America and also how they choose to confront or negate these factors for a comfortable means of survival in mainstream American society: for example, the evolving ways of naming ourselves as a group from colored to African American, even to the naming of our children and unique spellings for child names. Arguably, these four factors are products of the African American perception of their position in mainstream American society.

Ogbu provides more detail of the sociocultural history of African Americans that supports how these above-mentioned factors perpetuate notions of identity. In sum, these experiences, beginning with slavery, moving through Reconstruction, Jim Crow and Civil Rights, and arriving to the current era of “Post-soul” have developed a “collective experience of oppression and exploitation [which] caused [Blacks] to develop the sense of Black community which embodied their collective racial identity” (Ogbu, 2004, p. 8), where “the residue of [these] belief[s] remains” (p. 17). These factors play a major role in how Blacks come to identify themselves within mainstream American society in relation to their personal understanding of Blackness.

How does this impact the identity of the black family? If we examine the family identity as a collective identity through shared experiences, what we have is an overlay of experiences from the ethnic community that is imposed on the shared experiences of the black family. Not only is identity defined by the shared experiences within the family, these shared experiences are further explicated in their relation to the shared experiences of the African American community in general.

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