Identity narratives of black domestic workers' adult children partially reared by their parents' white employers
Date
2016-02-18
Authors
Curtis, Kay
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Abstract
This study has investigated the identity narratives of a particular group of young black adults who
lived during their childhood with their domestic worker parent(s) or grandparent, while at the
same time being incorporated to some significant extent into the homes and lives of their
parent(s) or grandparents’ white employers. The research sought to reveal how this unique
home environment, positioned within the socio-political context of a changing South Africa,
might have impacted on the identities these participants construct for themselves. The study is
qualitative in design and uses an interpretivist, phenomenological paradigm, privileging the
speaker and their lived subjective experiences. Identity was viewed as fluid, multiple and
constructed in contextual and relational ways. Semi-structured individual interviews were
conducted with eight adult participants, male and female. These were transcribed and a
narrative analysis of the form and a thematic analysis of the content was undertaken. The
research revealed the strong influence of childhood contexts and relationships, together with
social discourses of whiteness and blackness, on the identity narratives of these participants. It
brought to light the dislocation from cultural roots and the effects of western culture on their
identity positioning. It illuminated the complicated and sometimes contradictory identity
subjectivities these participants narrate and yet at the same time revealed the suggestion of new
identities and ways of being, that are different from the past, for these participants in South
Africa today.
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Description
A research report submitted to the Faculty of Humanities, University of the
Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the
degree of Master of Arts in Community-based Counselling Psychology