Appendix B
The Haitian American Fathers Study
Appendix B
The Haitian American Fathers Study
Since the 1960s, mainstream discourse in both the social sciences and the popular press has characterized fatherhood among black men in U.S. culture primarily from a negative perspective (Biller, 1968; Moynihan, 1965). The “crisis of black men” has been linked to high rates of early childbearing, and marital separation and divorce. Hunter and Davis (1994) have pointed out that studies of black women have highlighted how adversity has generated creativity and resilience, whereas research on black men has emphasized emasculation and pathology. Similarly, mainstream research paradigms have minimized the diversity among black fathers, underlining role failure, rather than adaptation and strength. With some important exceptions (e.g., Hossain & Roopnarine, 1993; McAdoo, 1988, 1993) research on black fathers has focused primarily on the stresses of teen fatherhood (Kiselica, 1995, Robinson, 1988) and on father absence (e.g., McClanahan, 1986; Mott, 1994).
The current study presents an alternative to the negative stereotype of black men as uninvolved and/or irresponsible fathers. It describes a group of married, Haitian American fathers from diverse economic levels who are actively involved with their children. This study is part of a larger qualitative research project that documents the diversity of fatherhood identities within U.S. society. The goal of our fathering research is twofold: to provide a detailed description of the fathering practices of men from a variety of subcultures to maintain a high level of paternal involvement; and to develop middle level theories of father involvement. Middle level theories are based on a detailed analysis of a particular subculture, as opposed to high level theories, which are intended to apply to larger populations of many subcultures. We expect that the data will reveal a variety of strategies that successful fathers use, and a number of different family contexts and societal structures that support those strategies. We plan to elaborate this material into theoretical models for promoting involvement among men who have not yet found a way to become active, responsible fathers.
Our work originates from a model of feminist research which is consciously reflexive. Reflexivity is defined as a critical examination of the research process. Thus, we acknowledge that our interest in fathering emerges from a particular political perspective (Silverstein, 1996) in the intense social controversy surrounding responsible fatherhood. Many conservative social theorists have linked responsible fatherhood to marriage and the traditional nuclear family. They advocate reinstating a hierarchical family structure in which the father is the “leader” or “head” of the family, and the mother a valuable subordinate. Less conservative theorists have conceptualized the fathering role as independent of any particular family structure, and therefore assume that positive father involvement can exist within many different family forms.
Our theoretical model seeks to encourage father involvement with subordinating mothers or minimizing their importance. We define responsible fathering as behavior that is based on an emotional attachment to a child which is independent of the father’s relationship to a child which is independent of the father’s relation to the child’s mother. Thus dissolution of that bond should not preclude continuing emotional attachment and active involvement between father and child. In addition, we believe that nurturing and caretaking are activities that are as integral to responsible fatherhood as to motherhood. Thus our broader agenda is to place attachment and nurturing at the center of the cultural definition of fathering, and, ultimately of masculine gender-role socialization.
We acknowledge that our subjectivity influences the way in which we conduct research. The two senior authors are both middle-aged, middle-class, white psychologists, trained in the positivist tradition. The third author is a young, middle-class Haitian American psychologist. We all have intense histories with our own fathers (and mothers) which undoubtedly have influenced our decision to study fatherhood. We are all parents, two of us have biological children, the other is a step-parent. We share this information because, in contrast to the positivist tradition, we know that the personal characteristics of the researchers are relevant to research process and findings (Allen & Walker, 1992).
This article presents a detailed description of the subjective experiences of a group of Haitian American fathers, using their own words and concepts. We discuss our findings in relation to a metatheory about the transformation of fathering which is occurring within U.S. culture. This theory proposes four components which are necessary for role change: a sense of personal dissatisfaction with current role norms; a new set of behaviors which provide a sense of personal gratification; a facilitating ideology which prescribes the new behaviors and proscribes the old ones; and a supportive community which provides a system of social supports to help manage the anxiety that is an inevitable consequence of change. We believe that the data support our first two theoretical constructs, indicating that these Haitian Christian fathers have constructed a new definition of fatherhood which is more socially progressive and more personally satisfying than the traditional Haitian fathering role. We will speculate about the constructs of ideology and community which we believe have contributed to this transformation of fatherhood, but which are not clearly reflected in the data. We conclude with a suggestion about the importance of integrating both qualitative and quantitative designs into social science research.
Methodology
The Qualitative Research Paradigm
Hunter and Davis (1994) have pointed out that, because black men have been defined exclusively in relation to white male privilege, relatively little is known about how black men define themselves. The qualitative paradigm is particularly well suited to investigate voices and perspectives from nondominant cultures about which very little is known. Qualitative researchers explicitly acknowledge that their status as researcher puts them in the privileged position of member of the dominant culture and its definition of reality. This is especially true when the researchers are ethnically part of the dominant group, as are the senior authors. Therefore, qualitative researchers try to structure data collection collaboratively. Rather than imposing the researcher’s assumptions, participants are encouraged to use their own voices and to articulate their own experiences. Because qualitative research is neither as widely understood, nor as generally accepted, as a quantitative approach, we begin with a brief description of the general assumptions underlying a qualitative model, and then describe the particular variant that we used.
The goal of qualitative research is to generate thick description (Geertz, 1973, 1983), that is, the explication and detailed description of the world of the people who live out the phenomenon one is investigating. The descriptive material can then be analyzed to yield sensitizing concepts which articulate categories by which people understand their own world. Qualitative research develops grounded theory, that is, theoretical constructs, derived from and grounded in, the participant’s own understanding (Strauss & Corbin, 1990) The grounded theory can then be used to generate specific hypotheses which can be examined quantitatively.
Although there are differences in particular methods used by qualitative researchers, most share the same general procedure (Dey, 1993; Miles & Huberman, 1994). Qualitative research begins with a set of texts produced by members of a culture as they talk about, and reflect on, a social phenomenon. The participant’s own subjectivity and definition of the situation are reflected in these texts, which constitute the data of the qualitative analysis. The goal of qualitative research is to use the researcher’s own subjectivity in a disciplined way, in order to enter into and interpret the cultural world of the text. In older, ethnographic, traditions this understanding was then expressed in the form of an interpretive narrative. More recently, however, researchers aim at expressing their understanding by developing a structured system of categories that are coordinated with the text, and with each other (Richards & Richards, 1994).
Although there is not a mechanical recipe from extracting a category system from text, analysis generally includes three levels of categories; text-driven categories, coherence-driven categories, and theory-driven constructs (Miles & Huberman, 1994; Richards & Richards, 1994). Text-driven categories become visible because research participants often use relatively equivalent words and phrases. As the text-based category system develops, the researcher becomes aware that these lower level categories stand in logical or conceptual relation to each other, and therefore can be organized into coherence-based categories. The researcher then uses theoretical concepts from the research literature or from their own hypotheses to organize the coherence-based categories into theory-driven constructs.
Research Participants
The research participants were 20 Haitian American men recruited from a single Haitian Baptist church in Brooklyn, New York. Many of the men knew each other and the moderator, who was also a member of this church. All the participants had been born in Haiti, and had immigrated to the United States sometime during their teenage or early adult years. They all spoke English, French, and Creole. The men had been raised in a variety of family structures. The majority had been raised in a family with two parents, although some had been raised primarily by their mothers. Three of the men has seen their fathers leave their mothers for other women, or have children with other women while remaining married. Two of the men stated that they had never known their father.
Demographic information is summarized in Table B.1. The ages of the men ranged from 29 to 60, with a mean age of 40. They had been married from 2 to 34 years, and had from 1 to 5 children. Most of the men had graduated from high school. All of the men were employed, except for one who was a full-time student. Their income ranged from $0 to $70,000. With a mean income of $38,800. The frequency distribution of income and education shown in Table B.1 indicate that the sample is very diverse.
Focus Group Procedure
The guided conversation which constituted the research interview was conducted in a focus group format. Focus groups were used because they sample the experiences of a wide variety of subjects in a relatively easy fashion. Focus groups provide an opportunity for participants to report their individual experiences, and also respond to the experiences of other group members. Consequently, new information can emerge that is not available from researcher-designed survey instruments, individual interviews, or participant observation (Morgan, 1988).
The third author was the moderator of all of the focus groups. He asked the men six questions which took them through a narrative account of their fathering experiences; (1) When was the first time you thought about being a father, and what did you think it would be like? (2) What is your relationship with your father, and how has it affected your fathering? (3) How did you and your wife go through the process of deciding to have a child? (4) What is being a father like? How did it change your sense of who you are, and what your life is about? What are you most proud of, and what do you most regret? (6) How has being a father affected your relationship with your parents and siblings? Following this, the men were invited to share any thoughts they had not as yet voiced.
Five focus groups were conducted. Each group lasted approximately 1 1/2–2 hours. The groups ranged in size from three to six participants. The group discussion was videotaped and transcribed. The transcribed interviews views formed the text for data analysis. Some of the questions yielded responses more relevant to the concerns of this article than others, and consequently are over represented in our data analysis.
Data Analysis
We have used three levels of data analysis, (1) low level, text-based categories; (2) middle level sensitizing concepts, and (3) high level theoretical constructs. The procedure does not develop linearly from low to high level because the categories are continually revised to reflect the researcher’s evolving interpretation of the text. However, for purposes of exposition, we shall present our process of data analysis as if it were more or less sequential.
After all the focus groups had been conducted, and the texts of each group transcribed, the texts were read over by four members of our research group—the third author, another graduate student, and the senior authors. Working independently, each researcher selected segments of text which were seen as relevant to the basic concerns of the study. This selection process consisted of recording key words, phrases, and passages, which the participants themselves had repeated or otherwise indicated as important ideas. Each researcher then developed a set of Level One text-based categories which paraphrased or generalized the text itself. For example, many of the participants said that their fathering experiences had changed them in terms of becoming more responsible and mature. We used on of their quotes, It has changed you: it has reconstructed you, to represent this text-based category.
The list of sensitizing concepts was developed in a similar manner. Again, working independently, each researcher organized the text-based categories into clusters of Level Two sensitizing concepts (see Table B.2). These reflected tacit or explicit themes that were closed enough to the text that they should be recognizable to the research participants. For example, the Level One category cited above, It has changed you; it has reconstructed you, was grouped along with another similar idea under the more general sensitizing concept of An enhanced sense of self.
Because the subjective experiences of men from nondominant subcultures are relatively unknown to mainstream psychology, two outside researchers are always included in our data analysis of each fathering
subculture. In the case of Haitian fathers, another male Haitian graduate student and a male African American psychologist each coded one transcript into text-based categories and a list of sensitizing concepts. The data analyses of the outside raters were then added to the category list of the research group.
The research group then met together to compare and contrast each researcher’s organization of the data. The lists of key words, phrases, and passages were uniform across researchers. The Level One, text-based categories were likewise very similar. The most diversity existed among the lists of sensitizing concepts, but even here, there was overlap among researchers. The outside raters added new perspectives to the data analysis, which led to the further revision of the category system. For example, the Haitian graduate student deepened our understanding of the respect the men had for their own fathers. He also called our attention to the generational, as well as cultural, changes in the fathering role. After extensive discussion a single, comprehensive list of text-based categories and sensitizing concepts was established by group consensus. In the original analysis if the data, the third author organized a subset of sensitizing concepts into a set of theoretical constructs that derive from our metatheory of social change.
Although the number of categories is in principle arbitrary, we find that we can capture the essence of a text in from 25 to 40 Level One categories. Similarly, it is our experience that 10–15 sensitizing concepts (about one-third of the previous level) adequately reflect the sense of the data. Because of space considerations, we have not presented the full array of categories. However, the complete data set is available from the authors.
Reliability and Validity
Qualitative research addresses the issues of reliability and validity in a way that contrasts with a quantitative approach. As suggested by Rubin & Rubin (1995), we have established a procedure which is transparent (another investigator can know and check what we have done; communicable(the categories made sense to both the participants themselves, and to other investigators who want to use them); and coherent (the categories were simultaneously internally consistent, as well as reflective of both individual differences and genuine inconsistencies in the culture).
We have tried to achieve these goals by incorporating multiple raters at each stage of the research process. As an additional check on our interpretation of the text, we went to the church where the original focus groups had been held, and met with 10 of the 20 men who had participated in the study. This meeting occurred about six months after data collection. We presented the text-based categories and sensitizing concepts. In the ensuing discussion, the men confirmed the accuracy of our sensitizing concepts. Many of them commented, “I could have said that.” Others stated, “That is exactly how I feel.” They also sharpened our understanding of two of our theoretical constructs; their complex feelings about their own fathers and the traditional Haitian fathering role, and the role of religion and the church in their definition of fatherhood. We believe that presenting the researcher’s understanding of the data to the participants is essential in assuring the validity of the findings, especially when members of the research team are not members of the culture being studied.
Results
In this section, we present our text-driven categories and sensitizing concepts. Table B.2 illustrates the way in which the text-drive categories logically cluster into sensitizing concepts. The sensitizing concepts are presented here as subsection headings, and the text-driven categories as paragraph headings. Table B.2 also indicates our organization of the sensitizing concepts into higher order theoretical constructs, which will be presented below in the discussion section.
Praising Aspects of the Traditional Haitian Father
My Dream Was to Look like My Father
As Table B.2 indicates, 50% of the fathers explicitly praised aspects of traditional Haitian fatherhood. These men admired their fathers’ strength and sense of responsibility. They report that their fathers were positive role models for them.
C: . . . When I think of the days of my youth I can see my father and his dedication. The love that he has shown, and his hard working style, and his honesty. All that, they left a serious imprint on me. My dream was to look like my father. (Zizi, 1996, p. 221)
L: My father was a very good father. He is a guy who has justice. You cannot make him tremble in situations. . . . (Zizi, 1996, p. 170)
I Love the Way My Father Treated My Mother
F: I love the way my father used to treat my mother. . . . When we were going through some difficult times, he was kind of an emotional leader to keep us together by bringing something that would make us happy. (Zizi, 1996, p. 171)
There Is No Inch of Laziness in My Father
T: My father is extremely responsible. He will take time for his family. It does not matter what he has to do. There is no inch of laziness in my father. (Zizi, 1996, p. 177)
Dissatisfactions with Aspects of Traditional Haitian Father
In addition to the aspects of their fathers that the men admired, 60% of the men also expressed a variety of dissatisfactions about the way their fathers had behaved. The first two categories reflect their unhappiness with their fathers’ emotional distance
My Father Never Said I Love You
This subgroup reported that their fathers were not emotionally demonstrative, neither giving nor allowing expressions of love. The men recognized that this was culturally determined, and felt that the love was there, even though their fathers could not express it directly. All of the men in the current study reported that this was something they wanted to change. They wanted to express their love to their children directly and often.
AG: Sometimes we cannot go to our father and say to our father, you know something, I love you.
F: Yeah, it is part of our culture. For me especially, even though I never heard such a word from my father’s mouth such as I love you, the way they act to us and the way they deal with us makes me feel like definitely this guy loves me.
L: I tell you my father also never uttered the word I love you. . . . But you knew he did. I make corrections in my family. I must repeat to my children, I love them, I do not know, every several hours. Maybe every one hour. (Zizi, 1996, p. 179)
Adults Do Not Play
These men also reported that neither their fathers nor their mothers recognized play as a part of Haitian parenting. Several said that they felt unhappy about the absence of informality and playfulness in their relationship with their fathers, and wanted to create a different emotional tone with their own children.
F: There is one bad thing that I did not like about my father. I have to bring it up. I do not know how to play any sports. I will never learn how to play since my father never played with me. So I think I am trying my best to learn as much as I can, because I play with my kids. I take them out whenever I have the time.
ET: I think we could say that for most of us, the Haitian father figure is supposed to be strict, stern, strong figure, not to show any signs of weakness. No play, as they say, “Gran moun pa jouwe” [Adults do not play]. (Zizi, 1996, p. 180)
Sometimes the sternness in their father’s attitude was associated with authoritarianism and physical force. Many of the men found their fathers to be excessively strict. However, they also believed that strictness was a necessary component of good fathering. F and L below discuss the complexity of their attitudes toward discipline and corporal punishment.
When They Say Your Father Is Coming, You Run Inside
F: My father would beat the hell out of me if I did something wrong.
L: There was no such thing as playing around. So I always had someone watching to see when my father appeared at the end of the block. All they had to say is, “your father is coming,” and I would run inside. Every once in a while he would catch me playing and I would be in trouble. (Laughs).
Another group member asks whether F will spank has daughter.
F: Definitely I will. I think that spanking can help later in life. I’m not saying that. I will beat the hell out of my kid, but I will talk to my kid first. I realize that before you spank the kid, you must let her know why she is getting spanked. This is one of the things my father did not do. (Zizi, 1996, p. 176)
My Father Took Care of Other Children and Didn’t Care Much for Me
One of the cultural aspects of Haitian fatherhood that all the men rejected was the tradition of having children in the context of relationships with several women. A small percentage of the men had experienced this with their own fathers.
A: My father had only me with my mother, then he got married and took care of other children and didn’t care much for me, which is why I never had any relationship with him. (Zizi, 1996, p. 139)
One of the older men (aged 60) had fathered a child without being married. This had occurred in Haiti, before he had become a Christian. He describes his experience.
R: Naturally, it wasn’t God’s will. We did contrary to the will of God, which is why I have a child with her prior to marriage. That is a biblical violation. (Zizi, 1996, p. 134)
Defining a “Good” Father
All (100%) of the men were concerned with becoming a “good” father. Three major ideas characterized the men’s fathering ideal: being a responsible provider and protector; being less authoritarian than their own fathers had been; and being physically present and affectionate with their children.
My Job Is to Look Over the Family, Being a Provider, a Protector
All of the men agreed on this traditional aspect of fathering. Being a good father was a heavy responsibility, involving the traditional roles of provider and protector. The following quote gives the flavor of their experience.
DE: Being a father to me is a full time job, and beyond that. I find myself thinking about my family constantly, even at work. I’m thinking about the next thing to do for them, how could I provide best for them. I’m worried about their safety, calling constantly, worried about their whereabouts. . . . My job is to look over the family, being a provider, provider, a protector. It is like being a guard. (Zizi, 1996, p. 233)
You’re Not a Boss for the Children, You’re More like a Friend
Although all of the men, as we have seen, took on the traditional patriarchal role, most of them liberalized and qualified it, becoming a father who did not tyrannize his children. The following quote illustrates this change. The first speaker noted that this less authoritarian stance is a cultural change, which he attributed to being in the United States rather than in Haiti.
M: . . . As a father in the new generation and as a Christian and someone who has had the opportunity to go to school and receive an education, I believe that I made a great effort to accept and understand the importance of recreation with my children. . . . You are not a boss for children telling them to do this or that, you’re more like a friend who takes them to the park, plays with them. It (the old form of fatherhood) results from being raised in a Third World country. In those countries these things are priorities, but here in the U.S., play is extremely important for the child’s development. (Zizi, 1996, p. 249)
You Call Your Kid and Say I Love You
AG: As a Haitian father, I would like kind of to enhance . . . that you make sure that when you have your kind, you call your kid and say “I love you,” even if the kid is 20 or 22 (Zizi, 1996, p. 179)
L: There is not a day that passes that I do not kiss Morahia. You probably see me kissing her in church. . . . (Zizi, 1996, p. 179)
You Have to Be There Whenever the Child Needs You
A: When you have a child, there are certain times that you have to invest, spending time with the child. You have to be there for the child whenever the child needs you. (Zizi, 1996, p. 207)
H: I am always there for my kids. Like all of last week, I change the shift on my job so I can be there for the kids. (Zizi, 1996, p. 159)
Jesus Was My Role Model
We have seen references to God threaded through the men’s descriptions of their ideas about fathering. Many of the men stated that they explicitly tried to model their behavior on Jesus.
A: I saw the bad experience that my father had. He couldn’t support his Children. As a result, the children did whatever they wanted to do. They came in whenever they wanted, living a terrible life in the home. . . . I knew I would be married, I would have children and I had to take care of my kids.
Moderator: Who was your model?
A: Well, I can say in my life, I didn’t have a model. Jesus was my model. (Zizi, 1996, p. 138)
An Enhanced Sense of Self
All of the men expressed great personal satisfaction in their own fathering. They reported that fathering has transformed their lives in the direction of greater maturity.
It Has Changed You: It Has Reconstructed You
G: It has changed your life completely, you have a sense of responsibility. You do not think the same way, you cannot act the same way. You are everything for the child, not only are you the child’s friend, but you have to know when you have to be strict. At one point you have to be strict and soft. . . . It is a big responsibility, it has changed you, it has reconstructed you. (Zizi, 1996, p. 263)
P: When I was a younger person, I was kind of care free. You know, one who likes to go out, like the stuff that teenagers do without thinking. But being a father, you know that you have a family to take care of, to provide for. It makes you think twice before you do anything, so my lifestyle has changed. (Zizi, 1996, p. 197)
P: Being a father is a great privilege. Before I was married. I used to feel worthless—that I would rather die than live. . . . (Zizi, 1996, pp. 259–260)
FR: What brings me joy is that God gave me the courage, the strength and opportunity to assume my responsibility as a father. . . . My way of carrying myself changed. I’ve become a leader because the children that are growing up have to follow me. . . . (Zizi, 1996, p. 164)
You’re Looking at the Children Growing. It Is Beautiful
The men also express great pride and satisfaction in the whole experience of having children, as the following dialogue between the moderator and a father illustrates.
Moderator: What are you most proud of?
G: So! Me, I’m proud to see the children playing and you see it is you, It is yours, you made them. You’re looking at the children growing. It is beautiful.
Moderator: What do you most regret?
G: There are no regrets. I’m glad about the whole experience, my children, that’s beautiful. (Zizi, 1996, p. 264)
God Makes All Things Possible
For these men, much of their life is centered in religion. All of these men identified themselves as Christians. All of the men experienced God as an active force in their lives, taking care of them and governing the basic aspects of their life. The following quotes illustrate this conception of God, and the close relation between their religious beliefs and their family life.
We Are Co-Workers in the Field of God
C: After I got married, our relationship with God as children of God, and ourselves having children, I learned that God has a plan, and He wants us to be a co-worker in the field. (Zizi, 1996, p. 228)
C: Being a man is like being small god. You have a chance to form someone . . . to bring up a young mind. (Zizi, 1996, p. 229)
It Won’t Be Your Doing, It Will Be God’s Doing
AF: On the . . . point of economics, God never puts you in a situation where He would not provide. He always takes care of his children, my self being one. It changes me in a way, it gives more understanding. (Zizi, 1996, p. 229)
R: . . . each child she carries, the doctor always told her she would not survive. I told her, “as long as you are pregnant, God will always spare your life.” When she became pregnant with Rudy, she had decided to abort. Her blood count was so low, she became very pale. I said, “honey, leave the baby right where it is at. . . . God will make the birth occur. It won’t be your doing, it will be God’s doing.” (Zizi, 1996, pp. 134–135)
Discussion
The final stage in the development of grounded theory requires that we organized our sensitizing concepts into theoretical constructs that illuminate the transformation of fatherhood. In our view, this is both a “top down” and a “bottom up” process. It is top down because we use a meta-theory to guide the organization of the sensitizing concepts. It is bottom up because the theory must be supported by the sensitizing concepts.
Our metatheory addresses the issues of cultural role change. The structure of fatherhood is evolving in U.S. culture. Some groups are departing from the traditional definition altogether. Other men are maintaining or updating many aspects of the traditional role. Some changes are in the direction of power-sharing and role flexibility; while other modifications serve to maintain patriarchy and a more traditional sexual division of labor. Our metatheory focuses on the change process. It contains four constructs which we believe are necessary for change to occur: an internal sense of dissatisfaction with the old role norms; a new way of behaving that is experienced as personally satisfying, an ideology that prescribes new behaviors and proscribes old ones; and a system of social supports for managing the anxiety that inevitably accompanies change. Although it may seem as if these four constructs reflect changes that occur sequentially, or are in linear relation to each other, actually, these ideas represent phenomena that are interrelated, overlapping, and circular.
In this study, we found data to support the first two constructs, but not latter two. The sense of dissatisfaction with the old social organization we have called bicultural gender role strain. The new definition of fatherhood which is a more satisfying way of behaving we have called constructing a more gratifying fatherhood. Table B.2 shows these constructs, and the sensitizing concepts that they subsume. Table B.2 also presents one sensitizing concept that relates to the third construct, a facilitating ideology. Data relating to the other aspect of ideology, economic necessity, and to the fourth theoretical construct, a supportive community, did not emerge in the current study. We present these latter ideas as hypotheses to be tested in future research.
Theory Driven Constructs
Bicultural Gender Role Strain
Pleck (1981, 1995) has argued that gender roles always contain Prescriptions for behaviors that are mutually contradictory and internally inconsistent. Thus, attempting to conform to gender role expectations inevitably generates internal conflict and gender role strain. Gender role strain for these Haitian American fathers emerges from two primary sources; ideological and personal. For all of the men in the current study, Haitian culture was their original frame of reference. Thus, they were very much affected by Haitian fatherhood ideology. However, all of the men have lived in the United States for an extended period of time, that is, from 10 to 20 years. Most of them married and became fathers in the United States. Thus, they have also been acculturated to U.S. fatherhood ideology. This bicultural experience has created a particular version of gender role strain.
The majority of the men expressed disappointment in the emotional distance characteristic of their relationship with their own fathers. They wanted to be very different from their own fathers in terms of their emotional attachment to their children. Yet, most of the men loved and respected their fathers and used them as role models. These conflicting feelings about their own fathers caused a more personal version of gender role strain. We will present the contrasting ideologies of the traditional Haitian father and the more nurturant U.S. father, and discuss the men’s personal experience of role conflict and strain.
The traditional Haitian fathering role defined the father as the authoritarian head of the family, with control over mother and children (Bastien, 1951; Durand, 1980; Lasry & Frédérik, 1986). Gender roles were constructed by a rigid division of labor. The father was either the sole or primary provider. Household management and child care was left almost exclusively to mothers and other women (maids, aunts, grandmothers). Bastien (1951) gives an example of the rigidity of the sexual division of labor by describing the practice of wives hiring other women to help out in the home when they were ill, because husbands were unwilling to mind children or do simple chores. Even in matters of discipline, fathers were consulted only in the context of extreme transgressions.
Despite his lack of involvement in child care and household management, the father was considered the head of the family. Corporal punishment was used liberally by both mothers and fathers, because a child was considered “un petit animal” [a little animal] who must be tamed, and taught how to behave in society (Durand, 1980, p. 48). Bastien (1951) concluded that Haitian families represented an extreme version of patriarchy. “Le pouvoir paternal etait indiscute” [The father’s power was indisputable] (p. 23). A sexual double standard existed which considered extramarital relationships the norm among men, but provided legal punishment to women who committed adultery. Therefore, it was common for men to have children with several women. Children were not allowed to marry without their father’s consent, and they often remained under his authority throughout their adulthood.
A less extreme version of the traditional, patriarchal fathering role also is present in U.S. culture. However, gender ideology in the United States has recently prescribed an alternative, nurturing version of fathering primarily in the context of a more role-sharing, egalitarian family structure. Although there is considerable debate about the extent to which this role definition is myth or reality (LaRossa, 1988, Silverstein, 1996), the idea of a caregiving father has become a cultural image. This popular ideal of the “nurturant” father defines the fathering role as more affectionate and more actively involved than the traditional Haitian father.
In the United States, the majority of mothers are engaged in paid employment. This requires that fathers be present and assume some of the responsibility for child care and household management. Thus fathers in the role-sharing model are involved in the care and activities of children in a way that is very different from the traditional Haitian father. In addition to being actively involved, nurturing fathers typically express affection, both physically and verbally. This affectionate stance defines a relationship of emotional closeness, rather than the emotional distance that was prevalent among the participants and their own fathers.
The sensitizing concept, dissatisfactions with the traditional Haitian fathering role, reflects the men’s unhappiness with the authoritarian posture of their own fathers, and their determination to do things differently with their own children. The idea that adults don’t play captured the formality of the traditional Haitian father and the emotional inaccessibility which the traditional Haitian father and the emotional inaccessibility which the men experienced with their fathers. These fathers made sure that they were physically present and involved with their children, and they expressed their affection physically and verbally. One of the fathers in the feedback session illustrated how dramatic this shift has been. He described his reaction as his children reached over and began eating from his breakfast plate.
I was so happy—you can’t get inside of me to understand how happy I was— because in my family, the food would be sitting on the table, but no one could eat until my father came home.
Another characteristic of traditional Haitian fathering which these men have given up is the practice of having children in multiple unions. Roopnarine and Benetti (1996) have indicated how widespread this behavior is in Caribbean culture. In a recent survey of all of the countries in the English-speaking Caribbean, these authors reported that 25% of the fathers were in “friending,” or visiting relationships, and 20% were in common law marriages. Among men between the ages of 35 and 54, only 23% the fathers were married. The authors note that these patterns have been stable for over 150 years. The men in the current study, in contrast, have shifted away from these Caribbean role norms. All but one of the men have children in the context of only one marital union, and all of the men are resident with their children.
It is important to remember, however, that the men have not rejected, or even revised, every aspect of traditional Haitian fatherhood. The sensitizing concept, praising aspects of the traditional Haitian father, reflects the many ways in which these men admire their own fathers and want to be like them. The older generation of fathers communicated a sense of responsibility and a commitment to hard work which the younger men respect. In addition, the men continue to believe that some form of discipline is an important element of socialization for children, and thus an essential component to responsible fatherhood.
Thus, the current study indicates the complexity of integrating role norms from two cultural traditions. The men continually express ambivalence about whether they should define themselves as more similar to the traditional Haitian father or to the U.S. nurturing father. Their attitudes toward discipline reflect the strain that they are experiencing. Many of the men recalled their upset at being spanked by their fathers, and declared that they wanted to establish a less authoritarian stance with their own children. They wanted to assume the more democratic, U.S., ideal of being a friend, rather than a boss, to their children. Yet we also saw echoes of the more traditional idea that children must be “tamed,” when the men talked about the importance of discipline in later life. The attempt to integrate these two contrasting cultural ideologies generated the somewhat incongruous idea that spanking is acceptable, as long as an explanation is given to the child.
This ambivalence about parenting ideology was accompanied by internal conflict about criticizing their fathers. On one hand, virtually all of the men spoke about the pain associated with the emotional distance they felt from their own fathers. On the other hand, many of them seemed uncomfortable rejecting their father’s way of doing things. The depth of this ambivalence was expressed in the discussion that occurred in the feedback session. One father stated, “I can never remember sitting down and having a conversation with my father. I don’t want my kids to say that.” One of the fathers echoed this concern when he stated that his love for his father had always been tinged with dread. However, another man expressed the other side of the ambivalence by responding that dread was necessary in order to instill respect in children. One of the men defended the older generation, explaining that their values were appropriate for a Third World country. Still another argued that being strict must have been the best way because they (the men themselves) had turned out so well.
Thus, these fathers faced a number of interesting dilemmas. They believed that it was necessary for their children to respect and perhaps even dread them; yet they wanted to have a close, affectionate relationship with their kids. These fathers wanted their children to see them as emotionally accessible, yet they reserved the right to use physical punishment if the children were not obedient. Similarly, they wanted to do things differently than their fathers, yet they seemed to feel guilty criticizing them, and held on to the idea that their fathers’ way was the “best way.” Given the role strain that these conflicting feelings generated, it is not surprising that some of the men concluded, “I would go back to the old way,” if it would work in U.S. society.
Constructing a More Gratifying Fatherhood
If we compare the men’s definition of “a good father” with the traditional Haitian definition of the fathering role, we see that these fathers have maintained certain elements of the traditional role, and also made signifi-cant changes in the direction of the “nurturant” model. The traditional roles of provider and protector have been preserved in this new model of fatherhood. Supporting their children financially continued to provide a sense of self-esteem for these men. However, these fathers wanted to give up the authoritarian stance typical of their own fathers. For example, the men stated that they did not want to be a “boss” to their children, they wanted to establish the more democratic and emotionally connected relationship of a “friend.” Although they were not completely consistent in choosing to give up this authoritarian style, as their discussion about spanking suggests, still the desire to be less hierarchical was a recurring theme.
The sensitizing concept,enhanced sense of self, summarizes the happiness and fulfillment the men experienced from having children. Throughout the groups, the men expressed a profound feeling of pride in their children, “You’re looking at the children growing; it is beautiful.” Although they spoke about having less time alone with their wives, overall, they reported feeling no regrets about becoming fathers.
They also stated that becoming a father had increased their sense of responsibility. Prior to becoming a father, some of the men reported living only for themselves—staying out late, not letting anyone know where they were or what they were doing. After their children arrived, they realized that they were also living for someone else. This realization led them to change their behavior in terms of staying home more, taking fewer risks, and monitoring their interactions with their wives, so that the children did not observe arguing and conflict. One of the men felt the change had been so profound that he described being “reconstructed.”
The profound importance of the fathering experience for this group of men is illustrated in the declaration of one man, who stated that he felt worthless and unwilling to live until he became a father. A similar existential shift is reflected in the religious ideology of this group of Haitian Christian men. Children are seen as gifts from God, and through them God is experienced as actively involved in everyday life. As the men struggled to behave in a manner that was morally correct, they identified with Jesus which gave them strength and courage. Thus, their fatherhood experience provided them with a sense of higher purpose, that is, doing God’s will.
From our theoretical perspective, we believe that the traditional male role, in both Haitian and U.S. culture, socializes men to be out of touch with their feelings and emotionally isolated from their families and from other men (Levant & Kopecky, 1995). Thus, we are predisposed to believe that active fathering provides a degree of emotional closeness to children which is in itself gratifying and reinforcing of behavioral change.
Implications for Further Research
We believe that the data support our first two theoretical constructs, indicating that these Haitian Christian fathers have constructed a new definition of fatherhood which is more socially progressive and more personally satisfying than the traditional Haitian fathering role. In this section, we will speculate about the constructs of ideology and community, which we believe have contributed to this transformation of fatherhood, but which are not clearly reflected in the data. We conclude with a suggestion about the importance of integrating both qualitative and quantitative designs into social science research.
We were struck by the importance of the men’s religious beliefs in defining their fathering behavior. The sensitizing concept, God makes all things possible, reflected the link between fatherhood and divinity. We speculate that their religious beliefs serve two functions. On one hand, using Jesus as a role model may provide a substitute ideology that allowed the men to give up some of the authoritarian aspects of the traditional patriarchal role. On the other had, their sense of connection to divine omnipotence may serve to manage anxiety about change, and also maintain some of the power associated with the more traditional patriarchal role.
Feminist theologians have pointed out that, in contrast to the “male warrior God” of the old testament (Plaskow, 1990, p. 131), Jesus preached a religion of love, compassion, and mercy (Fiorenza, 1979). The nurturing aspects of Jesus as an alternative vision of God is a strong tradition in the Christian church. For example, women who were leaders in defining medieval Christian spirituality referred to “Mother Jesus” (McLaughlin, 1979, p. 101). Thus, identifying with Jesus may have simultaneously allowed the fathers in our study to maintain their position as a powerful leader in the family while at the same time encouraging them to be less dominating.
As we have seen, the ideology of the “nurturant father” was not totally comfortable for these men. Although the concept of being emotionally close to their children was appealing, they were not yet ready to embrace a consistently democratic parenting style. For the men in the current study, their Christian theology seems to have presented them with moral code in the context of a definition of masculinity that was less focused on domination. Yet, it did not require them to relinquish male privilege entirely, because, as one man reminded us. “Being a man is like being a small god.”
The current study did not examine directly the content of their religious ideology, and therefore our speculations about the ways in which it contributed to behavior change are not grounded in theory. We plan to include participant observation, such as spending time in church and in discussion groups, in our next study. In this way, we hope to test the accuracy of our hypotheses about the role of religion in supporting change.
A Community That Supports Active Fathering
Behavior change, even change that is desired and positive, always generates anxiety. Thus, in addition to a new ideology, people also need a system of social supports to bind the anxiety that is an inevitable consequence of change. We believe that the men’s involvement in their church may have provided them with a socially supportive atmosphere which validated their new behaviors, and helped them manage their anxiety as they transformed their fathering role.
In the feedback session with 10 of the men, we asked them if belonging to the church provided them with a social community that was helpful to them on parenting issues. One of the men said that he and his wife met informally with other couples from the church to discuss marital and parenting issues. Overall, however, the men responded that they felt the church needed to do more. They wanted to begin parenting classes and discussion groups. They explained that being a good Christian was the first step in becoming a good parent, but was not sufficient. They expressed a strong desire to have the kind of support groups we had assumed the church community was already providing.
In the current study, we believe that the church community is already providing some support to the men in changing their fathering behaviors. Coming to church every Sunday may provide the men with the opportunity to observe and interact with other men who are committed to marriage and to active fathering. Although the men express the desire for even more support, we hypothesize that belonging to the church community validates their behavior and absorbs some degree of anxiety. The presence of informal groups further suggests that the church community provides peer relationships within which these fathers can confirm their commitment to a shared ideology. However the design of the current study did not address these hypotheses. Thus, the role of the church community in the transformation of fatherhood will be explored in the next study.
Limitations of the Research
There are several limitations inherent in the design of this study. First, the data were collected in group interviews, which allowed the expression of collective themes, but precluded more in-depth personal explorations of these themes. This was particularly true because the participants and the moderator were all members of the same church. Thus the participants were known to each other and to the moderator. This lack of anonymity may have motivated some of the participants to withhold important information, or to express more agreement with group norms than they actually felt. Despite the fact that the focus groups were not tightly structured, and spontaneous interaction between participants in the groups was encouraged, data collection was structured by researcher-designed questions. Because the results are similarly structured by those questions, important aspects of the men’s fathering experiences may not be included in the findings.
The study is also limited by the fact that the data are self-report data. The men describe their cultural attitudes and behaviors, as elicited by our particular focus group interview. There may be many missing links between attitudes and behavior. To enumerate the most obvious; reported attitudes may differ from actual attitudes, reported behaviors may not correspond. Clearly, reports about behavior are not equivalent to direct observations.
In addition, these results cannot be generalized to all Haitian American fathers, or to all Haitian Christian fathers. All of the research participants were volunteers. Thus, they represent a self-selected sample of men who were willing to talk about their fathering experiences. They may differ in important ways from other Haitian American men, or even from other men in the same church who were not as interested in fathering, or who were not comfortable sharing personal experiences in a group.
Conclusion
We wish to concluded by examining the implication of our results and our qualitative methodology for the study of African American men, and for understanding the broader context of redefining masculinity. This article began with the premise that the research literature has, with few exceptions, presented African American fathers as deficient and irresponsible, passive victims of larger social forces. Our research revealed a very different picture. Our study indicate that “African American men” cannot be considered a homogeneous category. The fathers in our sample have creatively and responsibly developed a new pattern of fathering, drawing on traditional Haitian fatherhood, more recent developments in U.S. fathering, and Christian ideology. Our results have illustrated a particular variant of fathering which is a very specific adaptation to Haitian American culture. We assume that the study of a different subculture would reveal yet another specific and creative adaptation.
Our work also has applications to the broader cultural phenomenon of redefining masculinity. The present study indicates that masculine role norms are already in the process of being redefined in this group of Haitian American men. Preliminary date from our larger fathering project suggest that this process is under way in other subcultures as well. We believe that the general social transformation of the masculine role can be studied across subcultures, if viewed through a broad enough theoretical lens. However, we also have found that the particular form the change process takes is highly specific to a local culture. For example, husbands are in the process of sharing some power with their wives in the following middle-class communities that we have studied: Haitian American Christians, white neoconservatives and white politically progressive dual-earner couples. Yet, each subculture begins with specific values and behavior patterns, and then generates unique adaptations and revisions of their existing culture. We have chosen, therefore, to begin by studying local culture, and its indigenous conflicts and resources. Only then can social policy be designed to facilitate the change process by supporting plausible and manageable next steps for each subculture. We call this the “next step” theory of social change.
Finally, we wish to comment on the role of qualitative research in building our “next step” theory. We believe that our findings about Haitian fathers could not have emerged from a more quantitative research design. The senior authors were strangers to the Haitian subculture, and the third author was embedded within it. Therefore none of us was in a position to construct research instruments which had the appropriate balance of cultural relevance and objectivity. This is often the position of researchers approaching previously unstudied, nondominant populations. Consequently, qualitative research is an essential element of these investigations, as a complement to the more traditional quantitative paradigm. Integrating both approaches in the study of human behavior enhances theory building, because good theory must identify trends that are generalizable across groups, and also capture the specific, subjective experience of individuals.
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