Mother knows best : examining the impact of racism, colorism and sexism on Black mothering and its role in shaping Black daughters' womanhood and dating preferences

Abstract

Black women experience a form of triple jeopardy in which the intersecting dimensions of race, skin tone, and gender collectively shape their social positioning and influence a range of developmental and sociocultural outcomes. Prior research asserts that due to the triple jeopardy Black women face, they often rely on their mothers and networks of othermothers-- women who share in childrearing responsibilities-- to navigate their social environments. This dissertation examined how Black women internalized messages operating through interlocking mechanisms of racism, colorism, and sexism, which are mediated and reproduced through respectability politics and transmitted through the maternal socialization they received. It further explored how these messages shaped daughters' constructions of Black womanhood and informed their approaches to dating, including beliefs about who they should date to achieve and maintain respectability in a world that positions Black womanhood outside the protections of whiteness. Existing outside the protection of whiteness denotes the structural exclusion of Black women from the dominant, idealized category of womanhood that constructs white femininity as pure, delicate, and inherently deserving of protection. In such a racialized, colorist and gendered order, Black womanhood is regulated through controlling images (e.g., Jezebel, mammy, angry Black woman) that position Black femininity as deviant, masculine, or innately resilient, thereby legitimizing the withholding of care, empathy, and institutional safeguards. The current study uses a secondary qualitative analysis of semi-structured focus group data drawn from the lived experiences of 26 Black young adult women ages 18 to 24. Across eleven in-depth focus groups, participants described how their mothers and othermothers provided supportive guidance and protective scripts for embodying "respectable" Black womanhood, while simultaneously, whether intentionally or unintentionally, perpetuated and reinforced harmful messaging related to skin tone, womanhood, and dating. Findings showed how skin tone trauma operates within intergenerational dialogue, shaping the intersectional experiences of Black women, influencing not only their identities within Black womanhood but also their relational experiences. By centering Black young women's perspectives, this study contributes to broader understandings of socialization within Black families. Ultimately, the findings highlight intergenerational dialogue as both a site of protection and a mechanism of harm for Black girls and young women to learn how to navigate womanhood and dating on their own terms.