As we progressed through the course, a major theme that caught my attention was the masculinity behind parenting, and it’s effects on children. Despite having worked on five separate assignments, each with a unique prompt, I realized that two of them had a common denominator: fathers. For my portfolio, I chose to include my essay entitled “A Need for Love” and my multimodal “Proud Papa.”

As mentioned in my “About Me,” I was raised in a house full of women, and as much as I am an expert at how it impacts a girl to not have her dad at the typical elementary school father-daughter dance, I never even considered how this can impact boys.

“Where Have You Been” – Jay Z Lyrics (uncensored)

For my essay, I analyzed the impact that violence, neglect, and an overall lack of love can have on a black males. I used bell hooks’s specific idea of the need to love black men and the need for black men to experience love, from her book We Real Cool: Black Men and Masculinity, to illustrate how lack of love in a home can have negative impacts on black men. In James Baldwin’s Go Tell it on the Mountain, John Grimes struggles to deal with the realities of violence and lack of love from his family. hooks explains that the mere presence of a mother and father is not enough to successfully raise a child, and in order for that child to grow into an accomplished black man, he must experience love.

For my multimodal assignment I focused on one of bell hooks’s chapters titled “gangsta culture: a piece of the action.” I created a poster for an after school program in which black male students in high school will have the opportunity to spend time with their fathers, while gaining valuable life skills. hooks explains that boys often look for reassurance and acceptance, and when they don’t receive it from their fathers, they turn to the so called “gangsta culture.” This program aims to give these boys the opportunity to “make their Papa Proud” while gaining an education, in hopes of deviating those from the path of the “gangsta culture” and towards the path of success. The three aspects of success that I focus on include, getting a degree of higher level education, a prosperous career, and ultimately transforming these boys into fathers that will raise sons in their footsteps, putting an end to the “gangsta culture.”