Double Burden

Studies of contemporary black women are rare and scattered and are often extensions of a legacy beginning in the 19th century that characterized black women as domineering matriarchs prostitutes or welfare queens negative characterizations that are perpetuated by both white and non-white social scientists. Based on over 200 interviews this book departs from these conventions in significant ways and using a collective memory conceptual framework shows how black women cope with and interpret lives often limited by racial barriers not of their making.