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Assimilation Blues: Black Families In White Communities, Who Succeeds And Why (Contributions in Afro-American & African Studies)

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Beverly Daniel Tatum is the president of Spelman College, and formerly taught at Westfield State College, UC Santa Barbara, and Mount Holyoke College. She has also written books such as "Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?": A Psychologist Explains the Development of Racial Identity and Can We Talk About Race?: And Other Conversations in an Era of School Resegregation.

She begins this 1987 book with the statement, "What does it mean to be a middle-class Black parent living, working and raising children in the midst of a predominantly White Community? Does it mean opportunity, success, the 'American Dream' realized, or is it rootlessness, isolation, and alienation?"

Here are some quotations from the book:

"Almost all of the parents, 16 out of the 20, indicate that it is important for their children to have Black friends. In fact, the mother quoted above, while pointing out that her kids have 1 or 2 Black friends, really bemoans the fact that there have not been more." (Pg. 79)
"Is there anything about Sun Beach that makes life easier or more difficult? The sample respondents are evenly split on this question, some individuals taking both positions simultaneously. The advantages that were cited before are repeated. It's 'pretty,' it's 'safe,' it's '70 degrees year round.' Who would not want to live in a very beautiful, warm, clean, secure physical environment?" (Pg. 99)
"Though the example of Japanese-American acculturation suggest that reduction in group identification and cultural continuity is a possible outcome of residence in predominantly White communities, is it an inevitably unpreventable one?" (Pg. 126)