Tyrec’s sister, Anisha, is thirteen. While Ms. Taylor is away at work, Anisha frequently “mothers” her younger brother, for example, by reminding Tyrec to pick up his dishes. She enjoys socializing, and during the summer especially, she looks forward to spending at least part of each day hanging out with friends who live in the neighborhood. Eighteen-year-old Malcolm is in the process of graduating from high school and is also working full time. He is not certain of what he will do next; he might take some community college classes in the fall.
Tyrec is almost ten; he is a small, thin, sprite of a boy. He looks like his father. He is a solid student at Lower Richmond elementary school, getting mostly Bs and Cs and completing his homework regularly. He is compliant at school, but on his own turf, he can be very assertive with peers. As one field-worker noted:
Tyrec’s peers are really important to him. He’s much funnier, cooler (no whining) around his friends [than he is at home, when his mother is present]. With his peers he gets to have intimate conversations, games, forays around the neighborhood, [and] a context in which to develop a sense of autonomy.
Even in front of adults, including his mother, Tyrec is assertive sometimes. For example, in Burger King one Sunday afternoon, he puts his white Frisbee and his large drink (which he has not finished) on an empty table. An old white man in threadbare clothes comes in and heads directly for Tyrec’s table. When Tyrec calls out, “HEY! That’s mine,” the man changes his course, veering away from the table. Ms. Taylor giggles; Anisha and I laugh as well.
Ms. Taylor has an assortment of rules to guide her children’s behavior in and out of the home. Many of her expectations she articulates explicitly. She places a premium on respect for adults. All adults, whether they are related to Tyrec or not, receive automatic respect and deference from the children. They append a “Miss” to virtually all adult female names, for example, Miss Jo, with no prompting from their mother or any other adult, (something we observed other poor and working-class Black children do as well).2 Ms. Taylor does not allow cursing. She expects Tyrec to come home when she sends for him. She sets boundaries on how far he may go from home, as well as what kinds of things he may do (e.g., walk to the public pool to swim, ride his bike, play ball in the street, since cars are infrequent) and things he may not do (e.g., go across town, come home hours later than expected, drink, use drugs). He must do his homework before he is allowed to go out and play. It is relatively common for Tyrec to go on short binges of misbehavior—repeatedly coming in late, for example. One evening he was banished from Vacation Bible School for his poor conduct. At home, when things are not going his way, he routinely demonstrates his feelings by looking annoyed, whining, or crying. Most of Ms. Taylor’s disciplining consists of withdrawing privileges and restricting the children (Tyrec especially) to the house. At times, she turns a blind eye to Tyrec’s violation of her rules (as when he was out in the street playing with friends when he was supposed to be home, on restriction). She remarks that she thinks Tyrec’s periodic misbehavior is due to the fact that he has not had a beating recently. In her view, that kind of punishment can be helpful.
Ms. Taylor complains that Tyrec is often “hyper.” But her affection for her son is visible and often demonstrated. Indeed, both parents regularly offer their son physical affection, rubbing his head or giving him a hug. For example, one evening Tyrec is watching a video (The Game of Death, with Bruce Lee), fast-forwarding the tape to the fight scenes.
At about 11:15, [Mr. Taylor] returns. Tyrec gets up, goes into kitchen where parents are. Mr. Taylor grabs his son and hugs him from behind, rocks him back and forth for about thirty seconds, says: “Are you watching that foolishness?” Tyrec: “It’s not foolishness!” Mr. Taylor: “Yes, it is. You gettin’ indoctrinated in there.”
We observed this kind of aggressive edge to displays of affection between Black and white working-class fathers and sons.
Tyrec’s parents, in another effort to save their marriage,3 recently have started to “date.” Although each separately wants the marriage to work, when they are together, they clash frequently. Routine aspects of family life are often hotly contested. One Sunday, after a Vacation Bible School program, the two square off briefly:
Ms. Taylor says, “Tyrec, ask Dad if he is going to take us out for lunch at McDonald’s after the closing program.” Mr. Taylor says (quietly, but angrily, looking her in the eye), “Don’t set me up.” Ms. Taylor stares at him (standing, looking down) and he repeats, “Don’t set me up by telling them that.” She doesn’t say anything but walks off to the kitchen.
Mr. Taylor takes the family to Burger King, which is near his apartment. This choice prompts dissension, particularly from Ms. Taylor. She would have preferred going to eat in Millville, a shopping center located in a predominantly white area but frequented by a variety of racial groups:
[Ms. Taylor] says, “He had to come in the ghetto . . . [They have] dried up French fries . . . “ [Mr. Taylor] says, “I don’t like to go there. I am comfortable here; I like it here.” [Ms. Taylor] again (speaking to the field-worker, who had driven in a separate car), “We wanted to go to Millville, but he wanted to come here.”
This kind of verbal sparring and open conflict characterizes Mr. and Ms. Taylor’s relationship. Although sometimes there are friendly exchanges as well as comfortable silences, laughter is rare and tension is common.
ORGANIZATION OF DAILY LIFE: FREE-FLOWING TIME
Working-class and poor families organize their time differently from middle-class families. Children’s organized activities do not set the pace of life. Unlike the Tallingers, who consider a weekend quiet if they have only one or two events to go to, the Taylors are busy if they have one major event scheduled. Planned events of any kind are unusual for the Taylors, and the calendar is not the heart of the household. Children’s out-of-school time is relatively unstructured and, unlike for Garrett Tallinger, separate from adults’ worlds. When Tyrec and Anisha were young, Ms. Taylor’s grandmother would come to the house and watch them until Ms. Taylor got home from work. Now they are allowed to stay at home together without an adult. They generally are free to set their own schedules and choose their own activities.
Sometimes, Tyrec simply hangs out at home. One July afternoon, for example, after he returns from day camp, he, his friend Clayton, and I pass the time lying around companionably on the living room floor.
Tyrec is on the floor on his back, watching cartoons (I am lying near Tyrec) . . . Clayton is on the couch, sprawled out; he is trying to convince Tyrec to go swimming [in the public pool, a few blocks away]. As he talks, Clayton is arching his fingers forward and back in sequence. He looks languid. They are talking in low voices. Clayton can’t hear what Tyrec is saying. He slowly slides off the couch so that now he lies on his back on the floor in the small space between the couch and the coffee table. All three of us are lying on the floor with parts of our bodies jutting under the coffee table. (It all seems perfectly normal; no one makes jokes about it. We are just there.)
The amount of time allotted to any given activity varies. Television and video games are a major source of entertainment, but outdoor play can trump either of these. No advanced planning, no telephone calls, no consultations between mothers, no drop-offs or pickups—no particular effort at all—is required to launch an activity. For instance, one afternoon, Anisha and Tyrec walk out their front door to the curb of the small, narrow street their house faces. Anisha begins playing a game with a ball; she soon has company:
(Two boys from the neighborhood walk up.) Anisha is throwing the small ball against the side of the row house. Tyrec joins in the game with her. As they throw the ball against the wall, they say things they must do with the ball. It went something like this: Johnny Crow wanted to know. . . . (bounces ball against the wall), touch your knee (bounce), touch your toe (bounce), touch the ground (bounce), under the knee (bounce), turn around (bounce). Anisha and Tyrec played about four rounds.
Unexpected eve
nts produce hilarity:
At one point Anisha accidentally threw the ball and it bounced off of Tyrec’s head. All the kids laughed; then Tyrec, who had the ball, went chasing after Anisha. It was a close, fun moment—lots of laughter, eye contact, giggling, chasing.
Soon a different game evolves. Tyrec is on restriction. He is supposed to remain inside the house all day. So, when he thinks he has caught a glimpse of his mom returning home from work, he dashes inside. He reappears as soon as he realizes that it was a false alarm. The neighborhood children begin an informal game of baiting him:
The kids keep teasing Tyrec that his mom’s coming—which sends him scurrying just inside the door, peering out of the screen door. This game is enacted about six times. Tyrec also chases Anisha around the street, trying to get the ball from her. A few times Anisha tells Tyrec that he’d better “get inside”; he ignores her. Then, at 6:50 [P.M.] Ken (a friend of Tyrec’s) says, “There’s your mom!” Tyrec scoots inside, then says, “Oh, man. You were serious this time.”
Informal, impromptu outdoor play is common in Tyrec’s neighborhood. A group of boys approximately his age, regularly numbering four or five but sometimes reaching as many as ten, play ball games together on the street, walk to the store to get treats, watch television at each other’s homes, and generally hang out together.4 One afternoon, the boys stand around on the street next to a parked car. Heads close together, Tyrec and his friends pursue interesting conversations:
The first topic is about weird finger tricks. Shawn tells a story about a girl who could bend her middle finger back to the back of her hand, then lock her pinky finger behind the middle finger . . . Somehow the conversation turns to health and babies. Ken tells the boys that “what you eat, what you feed them, is how they turn out. So, you want your babies healthy, you should feed them healthy.” Tyrec: “I’ll feed mine pizza.” (laughter) Ken: “Nah, I’ll feed mine healthy stuff like fruit . . . Shawn: “Carrots?” Ken says loudly, “No, FRUIT.” Ken continues, “Even when your wife is pregnant, you got to feed her healthy.” . . . Then they move on to talk about how health is related to sports . . . Next, they talk about how someone’s sister is dating someone else . . . Soon after this exchange, Ken decides that he’s going to the store. Shawn says he’ll come. Shawn asks Tyrec if he is coming, too. Tyrec says that he needs to ask his mom first. He goes in; I follow.
Gender also played an important role in shaping Tyrec’s activities with his friends. Compared to the girls in the study, he was more physically active and was given more latitude in the distance he could travel from home as well as how late he could be out with his friends. In addition, many of their activities had traditional masculine elements, showing speed, prowess, athletic ability, physical strength and courage. Sometimes they tested each other to see how hard and how far they could throw things and took turns trying to break something. Pretending to fight, chasing and threatening to fight, and actually fighting were common activities.
(Tyrec and Anisha have been eating blue ice-pops and watching television; when they finish their treats, they go outside.) There’s a little boy, maybe six or seven, who immediately starts threatening Tyrec [saying], “I’m going to hit you! I’m going to beat you up!” Tyrec races around him, daring him to fight. Tyrec: “You first, man!” The boy prances around him, baiting Tyrec until he gets up the courage to hit Tyrec on the arm. Tyrec reacts, chasing him around in circles. The little boy laughs, enjoying the game. Tyrec looks a little less thrilled, but pretty enthusiastic about defending himself.
An ice cream truck selling treats comes down the street, interrupting the action briefly. When the truck leaves, the play resumes:
Tyrec picks up a stick, threatens to throw it. The boy laughs, races around until Tyrec does throw it in his direction. Anisha takes a break from talking to another girl to say, “Tyrec! Don’t throw that!” Tyrec ignores her. The little boy picks up the thrown stick and comes after Tyrec. They run in ever widening circles.
Anisha now calls out to Tyrec to tell their mama that she is down the street with her friend. Tyrec hears her, but he doesn’t answer.
An older boy, twelve, sitting on a neighbor’s car, jokes with the little boy: “If you throw that stick again, I’m going to throw you over that fence” (gesturing). The little boy spits on Tyrec, who chases him, a little angered (he scowls, no laughing here) by this, until he catches up with him.
They have run down the street, so they are now near Anisha and her girlfriend, who have made it to the end of the block.
Tyrec spits hugely on the boy—the boy’s shirt I later notice has a big blue stain from Tyrec’s ice-pop mouth. Anisha notices this and turns around to yell at Tyrec, who has run away from the boy to the opposite end of the block. She says, in between his arguments with her, “Tyrec! Why you spittin’? That’s disgusting! I’m going to tell mama when she gets home, you hear?”
As these examples make clear, unlike middle-class children, who tend to play only with children exactly their own age (organized activities are usually age-specific), Tyrec frequently plays with children of various ages. He is also comfortable joining older groups:
Tyrec disappeared around the corner . . . I walked to the corner and took a peek around. There were about nine people sitting on the steps and on a bench which was on the [sidewalk] pavement. Three of them appeared to be teenagers or [even] older.
Overall, daily life for working-class and poor children is slower paced, less pressured, and less structured than for their middle- and upper-middle-class counterparts. Because adults spend less time monitoring children’s activities, there is less emphasis on performance and more latitude for children to pursue their own choices. Children have a separate world from adults. Of course, there are limits to Tyrec and his friends’ autonomy. Parents impose rules to safeguard their children; and the timing of some events, such as errand running and meal times, is determined by adults. Visits to relatives also tend to be set by parents. As with most working-class and poor children, for Tyrec, contacts with kin—from large, extended family events on weekends to informal drop-ins on weekdays—are part of the fabric of daily life. His great-grandmother, several aunts, cousins, and both grandmothers live close by (three of his cousins live “around the corner, in the next block”). Two other cousins his age frequently stay overnight at Tyrec’s house. He often helps his great-grandmother with household chores on the weekend; when she needs him, Tyrec is required to assist his great-grandmother before he begins playing with his friends.
The daily lives of working-class and poor children are not, of course, idyllic. The children we observed were aware of their families’ often precarious financial position and of the constraints that lack of money imposes. They heard and repeated among themselves talk about the cost of things, the lack of money, and the need for more money.
SIBLINGS: SOMEONE TO COUNT ON
Tyrec’s sister and to a lesser extent his older brother are an important part of his life. Although Anisha can be bossy at times, she and Tyrec are close companions. They help each other out, providing mutual support when, for example, their mother is in a bad mood. They spend time together both inside the house and outside. They often watch television together or play video games together. Sometimes they laugh out loud as they sit together in the living room watching television. Other times, they squabble:
Tyrec settles on the floor . . . [to] continue to watch “Cosby.” Anisha comes back right at the end of the show, plunking down on the couch on the other end from me. Anisha says, “Tyrec, get this bowl off here. It’s going to fall. Take it to the kitchen.” Tyrec resists; he complains, I think, and doesn’t get around to taking it. He starts to goof around with the pillows, throwing them up in the air above his head as he lies on his back and catches them. He does this for about a minute and a half before Anisha says, “Tyrec, stop. Throw them to me.” Tyrec throws first one then the other at Anisha, who catches them and puts them on the couch neatly, with a disgusted “I’m-the-older-sist
er-I’m-tired-of-mothering-you” look. She says, “You’re retarded!” Then they settle into watching the second episode of “Cosby.”
Despite Anisha’s frequent chastisements of Tyrec, their relationship is far more cordial than the acrimonious sibling relationships we observed in middle-class homes, both Black and white.
I HAD A DREAM: TRYING OUT FORMAL PLAY
Middle-class mothers often take the lead in proposing activities for their children. In working-class and poor families, enrollment in an organized activity is not likely to occur unless children specifically request it. In Tyrec’s case, a passion for football led him to beg his mother to allow him to sign up for a team. She denied his repeated requests during third grade, citing many factors, including Mr. Taylor’s concern about the boy’s safety. As she listened to Tyrec’s pleas one evening during the summer before fourth grade began, however, Ms. Taylor was impressed by the vividness of her son’s longing:
He wanted to play last year, but we wouldn’t let him. We thought he was too young and he was very upset . . . And then I think he went to one of the practices with someone around here, one of his friends, and he wanted to sign up. He told me that he wanted to play football, and I said, “No, I don’t think so.” He said he wants to play so bad that he dreams about it. He saw himself running across the football field with a football in his hand.
She relented.
Soon, though, Tyrec began having second thoughts. Attending football practice meant that he had to cut short after-school playtime with his neighborhood friends. Faced with these competing demands, it was the organized activity that he wanted to drop:
After he started, after maybe the third time, he wanted to quit . . . He was having the problem of not being able to play with his friends because he had to leave them to go to practice. And I just didn’t let him—because he worked me over so good to get him signed up that I refused to let him not continue now. [Despite] all the frustration that went along with going, still, it was something that he started, so we were going to go ahead and get through it, and pray that we don’t have to do it again.
Unequal Childhoods Page 11
