Black and on Welfare: What You Don't Know About Single-Parent Women

In the article titled “Black and on Welfare: What You Don’t Know About Single-Parent Women” by Sandra Golden, she talks about the many struggles black women must face while seeking help from the government. She talked about her own experience walking into the welfare office and how she felt dehumanized, humiliated, and mentally abused because of the caseworker’s discriminatory attitude and insensitivity. According to the author, “it seemed the assumption that welfare recipients were unmotivated, unskilled, uneducated or undereducated, and responsible for bringing fatherless children into the world” (Golden 27) She goes on to explain the misconception that black women are not interested in holding a job and being able to provide for their family and prefer to stay at home. In 1999, Golden designed focus groups that brought different women together whose ages ranged from 18 to 40. Here they discussed their issues and concerns regarding the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act. Most of the women that participated in these focus groups all game to a mutual agreement that their self-sufficiency coaches (SSCs) treated them like they were stupid. Each woman also expressed that they felt “…their SSC was in control of their financial situation” (Golden 30). Women who were interested in getting a job through the federally funded training programs did not get placed in a job based on their skill level. Because the government was so anxious to place these women in the working force, they were placed in fast-food restaurants, nursing homes, hotels, cleaning services, and clerical positions. These jobs typically focused on hiring women, had poor salaries, and offered little to no benefits.

I found this article interesting to read. It was odd to me that the individuals who signed up for the job of helping women would treat them the way they did. SSCs believed that the African American women who came into the welfare office were illiterate and dumb because she may not have finished high school. In my opinion, the women who went to the SSCs office were very smart. “Although the women in the study did not have high academic literacy levels, they undoubtedly had achieved other forms of literacy based on their social contexts such as workplace, community and home” (Golden 31). The women going into the SSCs office knew that if they responded in a negative way to them, they would lose their benefits. They played smart and put up with a little degrading so they could provide for their families. Being book smart is not the only way to be considered literate.