Success and Survival: Black Advantaged Parents’ Views of Race, White Space, and HBCU Attendance

Abstract

The sociocultural norms of White spaces place Black individuals at greater risk of anti-Black racism, racial discrimination, exclusion, and violence. This reality requires that Black people develop sociocultural toolkits with strategies, behaviors, and knowledge to navigate and advance within society. Black parents play a critical role in readying their children for such survival and achievement in an unequal world. Existing scholarship on socialization focuses on Black parents raising preadolescent children, limiting our understanding of how Black parenting continues throughout emerging adulthood. Through the lens of college decision-making and the case of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), the author uses interviews with Black advantaged parents of college-bound children to explore understandings of the worlds children will enter as adults. Findings show that parents are aware of the burdens of Whiteness in its many forms in the environments where their children will enter and recognize that their children require sociocultural tools to succeed and thrive. These perspectives are made clear by parents’ discussions of the benefits and limitations of HBCU attendance. This article raises implications for understanding Black parenting, socialization, higher education, and transitions to adulthood and work.