Abstract
This paper explores the role and position of grandmothers in African-Caribbean families resident in Britain. The data used for this paper comes fromm a sample of 180 life-history interviews collected in 1995–1996 from three generations of Caribbean-origin people living in Britain and the Caribbean. Findings from this research suggest that African-Caribbean grandmothers resident in Britain have come to play a less active role within their immediate family compared to earlier historical periods. At the same time however, these grandmothers have come to take on a more a transnational emissary role for their family and kin located throughout North America and Europe. Caribbean-born grandmothers appear to be using more “modern” means for fulfilling certain traditional tasks like “child shifting”, “story telling” or acting as a “social safety net“. Using their agency African Caribbean-born grandmothers have been able to carve out new niches for themselves despite changes in family structure brought about by migration and settlement patterns in Britain.
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Plaza, D. Transnational Grannies: The Changing Family Responsibilities of Elderly African Caribbean-Born Women Resident in Britain. Social Indicators Research 51, 75–105 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1007022110306
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1007022110306