Abstract
The Nordic countries are now firmly ensconced in academia as gender-friendly welfare states. They are seen as pioneering countries with respect to changes in family life and gender relations and thus present an interesting forum for family research. This paper explores how gender caring relates to gender, religion and parenting in Sub-Saharan African families in the context of immigration to Finland. A constructionist perspective is employed to illuminate how guidelines or scripts established in these parents’ cultures are actively used and how they in turn influence their gender relations. Gender caring is conceptualized as an ethic of reciprocity, solidarity and obligation to ensure interdependence and strong bonds among black African parents. The article draws on in-depth interviews conducted with twelve couples mainly in the Helsinki area (which includes Helsinki, Espoo, Vantaa and Kauniainen).
Highlights
The Nordic countries including Finland are pioneers of change in gender relations and family life
The present article draws on the first round of data collected, namely in-depth interviews conducted with twelve couples mainly in the Helsinki metropolitan area. It concentrates on the following questions: How do black African parents describe their everyday life at home and work? What is their understanding of gender relations in the context of parenting? What is the role of religion in their lives?
The father refers to the commitment of the family unit as husband and wife who love, care and tolerate each other, because they share everything together. It is a position grounded on indigenous knowledge of black African parents, sometimes called local knowledge, and it implies a social diagnosis of their narratives which is rooted in their religious and cultural beliefs, a positive line of thought that is imperative in terms of their economic, social and spiritual development
Summary
The Nordic countries including Finland are pioneers of change in gender relations and family life. Black African parents constitute the highest group from Africa living permanently in Finland (Finnish Immigration Service 2011) They have often lost the social structures that supported their parenting values, beliefs and strategies (see Ochocka & Janzen 2008). It is not accidental that their everyday constructions produced in this analysis are articulated around a number of themes – such as paid employment, home life and religious life These themes reveal cultural notions of parenthood among black African parents and some trends regarding their integration processes in Finland. The present article draws on the first round of data collected, namely in-depth interviews conducted with twelve couples mainly in the Helsinki metropolitan area It concentrates on the following questions: How do black African parents describe their everyday life at home and work? Black African parents are still being assessed against new Nordic family ideals (gender equality, shared parenting, and dual-earner/dual-caregiver)
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