English Rustics in Black Skin PDF Download

Author: Sidney M. Greenfield
Publisher: New College & University Press
ISBN: 9780808401223
Category : Barbados
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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Book Description
"The overwhelming majority of Barbados' swarming multitudes are descendants of slaves who came from Africa, but the sources of their institutions are to be found elsewhere. The stream of culture-history in which they live came from England. Inhabited by the descendants of Africa, then, Barbados is truly "Little England" in its cultural tradition. As a philologist observed at the beginning of the present century, "the Barbados Negro is an English rustic in a black skin." The family system of these "Black Englishmen" is rooted in the cultural tradition of England and therefore its similarity in form and structural integration to the family system found in other English areas is to be expected. Since the vast majority of its inhabitants are lower class and live close to a subsistence level, the statistical predominance of matrifocal families is understandable. The occurrence of subnuclear families based on the mother-child bond can be correlated with the occupational frustration of adult males. This book is a methodological attempt to integrate structural-functional and cultural-historical analysis in the study of the family, a specific social institution which has been the subject of considerable controversy and conflicting opinion in the literature on the area. Attention is given to the historical factors which contributed to making Barbadian culture what it is, and an analysis is made of the relationship between household, the family, and the total society. It is learned that the family, as a social system, is the problem, rather than matrifocality, which is only one form of the family. Furthermore, this book predicts that a possible future rise in the standard of living, resulting from an expansion of the economy, would bring with it an increase in the percentage of stable nuclear families based on marriage, similar to that found in other Anglo-Saxon nations."--Page 4 of cover.