ASHAMED OF HIS WHITE MOTHER

The Color of Water: A Black Man’s Tribute to His White Mother

by James McBride (New York: Riverhead Books 1996/2006)

Introduction

It is hard to be different from those around you, especially when young. We want to blend in and be accepted. Our societies have taught us to fear difference, and for this we do as much as possible to become invisible in the crowd. But when that isn’t possible for us or for a loved one, we must decide how to react—to be ashamed of the difference or to recognize and appreciate it.

Summary

A young man grows up in New York City, the son of a white Jewish-European immigrant mother and an African-American father. He struggles to understand his mother, her distrust of whites, her ability to ignore insults, and her secretiveness. In so doing, he better understands who he is.

Excerpt from pages 100-101

“Whenever she stepped out of the house with us, she went into a sort of mental zone where her attention span went no farther than the five kids trailing her and the tightly balled fist in which she held her small bit of money, which she always counted to the last penny. She had absolutely no interest in a world that seemed incredibly agitated by our presence. The stares and remarks, the glances and cackles that we heard as we walked about the world went right over her head, but not over mine. By age ten, I was coming into my own feelings about myself and my own impending manhood, and going out with Mommy, which had been a privilege and an honor at age five, had become a dreaded event. I had reached a point where I was ashamed of her and didn’t want the world to see my white mother. When I went out with my friends, I’d avoid telling her where we were playing because I didn’t want her coming to the park to fetch me. I grew secretive, cautious, passive, angry, and fearful, always afraid that the baddest cat on the block would call her a ‘honky,’ [derogative term for a white person] in which case I’d have to respond and get my ass kicked.”

Questions and Discussion

This young man lived in an-all black neighborhood with his black siblings and white mother. How might his feelings toward his mother and her whiteness have been different if they lived in a predominantly white neighborhood? Or if he lived in a racially integrated area? If it was present-day New York City instead of New York City during the 1960s when African-Americans were fighting for their equality both in the law and in society?

Why did his mother seem to not notice skin color, especially hers, being a white mother of several black children?