The use of the “eye” as a form of behaviour control also quickly goes out of the door in America. One diaspora mother who was trying this technique to correct her child’s misbehaviour in public said the child asked her loudly, “Mommy, what is wrong with your eyes?” It might be an ingenious response to disobey and embarrass the mother, or just a lack of awareness…
America has been described as an adult-lowering and child-raising society, which means the rights of a child preclude the rights of an adult to determine what may or may not be good for the child. It is a bitter pill most immigrant parents learn to swallow if they want to keep their children and not end up in jail. “The rights of the child” is one of the new concepts immigrants must acknowledge when they become parents or emigrate with their young children. Raising children at home is not controversial because we all agree on the ideal cultural values and norms required for child rearing. Not so in America. There are so many subcultures and ideas here on how to raise a child that the universal agreement seems to be the rights of the child. Even that is sometimes contested in court by some parents and communities who feel they should have more control over their wards than the state. Some parents feel they should be able to spank their children, within limits, without being hauled off to jail.
The eye is a powerful non-verbal mode of communication between parents and children at home, especially between mothers and their children. I knew every permutation of my mother’s eyes when she felt I needed to be corrected for an infraction, because the Yorubas agree that a good child knows “the eye” and a bad one doesn’t. It means a child does not have to be told everything verbally to understand what is required in a social situation; that the looks from parents are enough. The only rights a child has are what the parents grant him. It means a child does not interrupt or participate in adults’ conversations unless invited, a child is respectful to authority figures starting from parents and teachers, and anyone old enough to deserve it. A child shows gratitude for what she’s given and does not assume or insist he deserves certain material things, whether the parents want him to have them or not. Apportioning resources and duties in the house, such as space, time, money, cars, electronics, who washes the dishes, cleans the bathrooms, takes out the trash, is the prerogative of parents, but this parental domain is sometimes fiercely contested by many American-raised children, who feel they have equal say in these matters. The idea of “omo alaigboran”, a child who does not listen and follow instructions given by parents, does not hold water here. The child who talks back and asserts independence is sometimes lauded as smart and adventurous. Proverbs, aphorisms and time-tested “wisdomisms” lose their power to counsel and correct behaviour because the children are in a very different cultural situation, and translation to English generates hilarity from children who see such sayings as meaningless or utterly ridiculous. Stripped of the cultural settings in which they are derived, their meanings are completely lost in translation, especially in a society like America where communication is deliberately very literal.
The use of the “eye” as a form of behaviour control also quickly goes out of the door in America. One diaspora mother who was trying this technique to correct her child’s misbehaviour in public said the child asked her loudly, “Mommy, what is wrong with your eyes?” It might be an ingenious response to disobey and embarrass the mother, or just a lack of awareness of the meaning of the look. Corporal punishment, the long-cherished mode of disciplining by parents, is not allowed under any circumstances. It is considered child abuse and could send a parent to jail. Children learn quickly that they have rights and can get their parents in a lot of legal trouble by calling 911, the number for emergency situations in the United States. It is not unusual for small children to come home from school telling their parents in their innocent voices, “you are not the boss of me”, in defiance of parental authority. For many immigrant parents, the socialisation in school is vastly different from that at home.
Still, diaspora parents soldier on, raising children within a bicultural parenting framework, balancing what is good in both cultures, and negotiating with children on the best way for them to grow up into productive, well-adjusted adults with good values.
While we may have grown up with “abo oro la nso fun omoluabi, to ba denu e a dodidi”, meaning we speak only half a word to the well-brought child, it becomes whole once he or she digests it, diaspora parents are raising children in America where verbosity is a virtue. This has several consequences for children coming from cultures where speech is regulated and is the preserve of adults during adult-child interactions. Immigrant children learn a new rule of communication different from what operates in their families. While parents may prefer obedient children who do not talk back or ask the irritable “why” when given instructions, the children have to learn to speak up and ask questions in class, because the society regards a loquacious child as the smart child. Teachers might regard a quiet child as not very smart and treat her as such. This goes along with respect for authority figures. Showing deep respect for parents and teachers is not as cherished here. We had some teachers in our children’s elementary school who wanted the young students to call them by their first names. Elderly people are comfortably called by their first names by younger people, young enough to be their grandchildren. This is a taboo in many of our cultures.
Still, diaspora parents soldier on, raising children within a bicultural parenting framework, balancing what is good in both cultures, and negotiating with children on the best way for them to grow up into productive, well-adjusted adults with good values. There is one last card some parents play when children can no longer be controlled and engage in behaviour that might destroy their future. It’s the one-way ticket home, for re-education. Children are sent to attend schools at home and sometimes live with extended family members. This exposure to different cultural realities seems to yield positive results in most cases, with the children coming back with a better sense of themselves and an expanded and healthier world view.
One other important factor parents must be mindful in the U.S. is raising children in a racialised society. Parents who are confronting blackness as an identity for the first time, because such an identity does not exist back home, often do not fully understand the implications and the damage this encoded racism does to the development of young children. To raise black children is to be aware of the racism in American society that targets children very early in their development.
It’s a new world of infinite choices. It could be confusing, disorienting and frustrating, but with common sense, love and mindfulness, many diaspora parents are raising successful children in America, contributing their most valuable asset of all to their new country…
Parents who follow their own cultural instincts and training brought from home may not have empathy or understanding for their children’s encounter with racism, from their peers, teachers and the society in general. This puts children at a great peril, physically and psychologically. So many influences are inimical to the healthy development of black children in America. It takes an acute awareness of the society and a willingness to allow children to talk about their problems, to be successful as parents. Black children here face a particular degradation of black humanity unknown to parents who grew up at home. It’s both subtle and overt. Recently, a Yoruba mother in Florida was shocked to see her 11-year-old son handcuffed by the police after playing basketball in a police-organised game. Apparently, the young boy did not hear the police officer call out he should stop bouncing the ball. Without any scruples, the white police officer handcuffed the poor boy telling him he would know what it felt like to get arrested. The mother was in the crowd unaware of the situation until she was alerted. She described her son as a honour-roll student, mild-mannered, and doing the good things we all want our young ones to do. All the police officer saw was a black boy, to be controlled, humiliated, and sometimes murdered. Diaspora parents have to learn to be what Americans call “helicopter parents”, to monitor and guide their children through a treacherous and dangerous racist landscape. This includes paying very close attention to the kind of friends a child has. Peer influence has a huge impact on a child’s values and development, especially in the pre-teen and teenage years. The old adage holds firm, “show me your friend and I’ll tell you the kind of person you are.” Some of our young people have lost their way because of their choice of friends.
A generation of children of African immigrants has now reached adulthood in America, creating their own families. Many are leaders in their chosen professions and are making significant contributions to American society. This success comes from good parenting by numerous diaspora parents, in spite of the many challenges. Forty-one-year-old Bozoma Saint John is a fine example. Her net worth is said to be $20 million. She was born Bozoma Arthur to Ghanaian parents who emigrated to the United States. Her father earned a Ph.D in ethnomusicology at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, where Bozoma herself later earned her Bachelor’s degree. Her parents wanted her to be a doctor and she dutifully applied and was admitted to medical school (no mean feat here), but she negotiated her way out of it and followed her passion into music and pop culture, building a spectacular career with mega companies like Apple, Pepsi, Uber, and now Endeavor. She is one of the most notable black female business executives in America today. She credited her success to her parents who fostered certain African values in her, despite her resistance when she was young. They obviously successful blended American and Ghanaian cultural values and norms to produce a child who is not only eminently successful professionally in the American business world, but also has a deep appreciation of her Ghanaian heritage. Her parents gave her the wings to fly and she was rooted in their core values as Ghanaians. Her late husband, Saint John, was a white native of Massachusetts. By all accounts, theirs was a very loving marriage, even though tragically short. The choices she made in her professional and marital life are perhaps not the traditional choices of most diaspora parents, who expect their children to go into tried-and-true professions like medicine, law, and engineering, and then marry someone from their ethnic group, if possible.
It’s a new world of infinite choices. It could be confusing, disorienting and frustrating, but with common sense, love and mindfulness, many diaspora parents are raising successful children in America, contributing their most valuable asset of all to their new country – their beautiful, smart, productive, and compassionate children.
Bunmi Fatoye-Matory was educated at the Universities of Ife and Ibadan, and Harvard University. She lives with her family in Durham, North Carolina. She is a Writer and Culture Advocate. Email: bunmimatory@yahoo.com
Picture credit: chomskyweb.wordpress.com.
