Introduction
By Haile Eshe Cole, Luciane Rocha, and Shana Calixte

Section I - Education: “Firm when it's necessary, your words be understood…”

• Mother and Child
Artwork by Devynity Wray

• Freedom Choices: Black Mothers Living in Jim Crow Protect Their Children From Anti- Black Racism And Prepare Them For Success
By LaShawnDa Pittman, PhD, Alana Lim, Ayan Mohamed, Mia Schuman, Rachel Vulk, and Rina Yan

• A Lesson I Did Not teach
Poem by Jameka Hartley

• Known Black
Poem by Jameka Hartley

• Nana Would Pull Magic from Out Her Pocketbook
Poem by Devynity Wray

• Mama Illusion
Poem by Toya Groves

Section II – Motherwork: “You will protect me with love…”

• Dear Mama
Poem by Alexis Henderson

• Hard Questions
By Traci Wint

• Ay-Yai! Black Mother Leadership and Storytelling Traditions
By Stephanie Fearon

• Does Anyone else care? Black mothering in the time of COVID and Black Lives Matter
By Chelsi West

• Thank God for Aunties
Poem by Devinty Wray

• The Light We Carry
Interview with and Photography by Heather Lynch

• For You, Infinitely
Photography by Adriel Barnett

Section III – Violence and Trauma: “Rinsing pain and casting wishes…”

• Almost Human
Photography by Haile Eshe Cole

• Conto De Cantos Chorados: Single Mothers’ Experiences
By Cynthia Rachel Pereira Lima

• The Occlusive Carceral Tactics of White Womanhood
By Erica Ewa-Elechi and Josh Lamers

• I Beat Yo’ Ass”: Spanking in Multi-Generational Immigrant Families
By Christina Santi

• Fires Rose
Poem by Toya Groves

• One Day at a Time
Photography by Luciane Rocha

• Finding Joy on His Joy
Photography by Luciane Rocha

Part IV – Resistance: “I know I’m not the only one…”

• Protest: Mothering by Example
Photography by Luciane Rocha

• ‘I am parenting Black children for the world’: Black mothers’ insights on state-sanctioned violence and the fight for Black lives
By Seanna Leath, Dawn Demps, and Johari Harris

• The Judicialization of Black Suffering: Black motherhood and the flow of the Criminal Justice System in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
By Luciane Rocha

• The Revolution will be Black, Queer, and Mother-Led
By Pascale Ife Williams and Johnae Strong

• Motherhood in the Land of Hope
By Jameka Hartley

• My Afro-Cultural Renaissance
Poem by Azenia Whitaker

• Soiled Bandanas
Poem by Toya Groves

• At the March for George Floyd
Poem by Toya Groves

• The Dead Have a Voice
Photography by Luciane Rocha

• Investigate!
Photography by Luciane Rocha

This timely anthology brings together
diverse voices reflecting on Black
motherhood as a site of vulnerability and
resistance. Mothering and Mother(Work)
in the Times of Black Lives Matter makes
a thought-provoking contribution to
contemporary intersectional feminist
discourse, especially in its commitment
to centering Black maternal knowledge
and labour as political, intellectual, and
embodied work.

Contributions span academic analysis,
creative writing, and personal narrative,
with contributors examining how Black
mothers navigate conditions imposed by
anti-Blackness, from over-policing and
educational inequity to carceral violence.
Highlights include Luciane Rocha’s
account of the Brazilian carceral state’s
impact on Black mothers, and Haile Eshe
Cole’s reflection on maternal survival
under Jim Crow.

In “‘I am Parenting Black Children
for the World,’” Seanna Leath, Dawn
Demps, and Johari Harris write, “Black
mothers feel a tremendous responsibility
when thinking about their children’s
potential encounters with police officers
in the US.” This sense of responsibility,
grounded in structural awareness, is a
recurring theme. Such insights make
clear that the labour of Black mothering
extends far beyond the private sphere,
and is frontline work in a larger struggle
for justice.

The anthology’s consistent engage-
ment with the Black Lives Matter (BLM)
movement provides a galvanizing through-
line. For readers seeking affirmation and
insight into how mothering intersects
with activism and collective struggle, this
thread offers grounding. Many chapters
take their urgency from the 2020 uprisings,
signalling BLM as a continuing social
movement, though not engaging current
debates about BLM’s direction or
institutionalization. The collection
remains rooted in the understanding that
maternal resistance is daily, cumulative,
and often thankless.

At times, one wishes for a slightly wider
lens: more space for tensions or divergence
in how movements shape maternal realities.
But, the focus here is purposeful, and the
solidarity among contributors is part of the
collection’s power.

Mothering and Mother(Work) is a
deeply affecting collection and a good
resource for scholars, educators, and
activists. It emphasizes that understanding
motherhood, especially Black mother-
hood, is to understand nurturance
as political. It involves awareness of
everyday acts of maternal resistance and
knowledge that sustain lives and push
movements forward.

- Review by Maki Motapanyane

Haile Eshe Cole has a B.A. in Sociology and African-American Studies and a M.A. and PhD in Cultural Anthropology from the University of Texas at Austin. Over the years, Haile has conducted research on alternatives to incarceration for mothers and their children in both Texas and New York as well as maternal and infant mortality for Black women. She has served on the faculty at a number of academic institutions teaching courses on reproductive health, film/media and various other social justice topics. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor at Central Connecticut State University.

Shana Calixte Pitawanakwat lives on the unceded territory of the Anishinaabe peoples in northern Ontario, Canada. She is the Director of Health Equity at Ontario Health and has experience in the public health and mental health sectors. She has a Bachelor of Journalism from Carleton University and an M.A. and PhD (ABD) from York University. A former sessional lecturer at Thorneloe University, she focused on gender studies, embodied research, and mothering pedagogies. Following the university's closure in 2021, she became an Honorary Fellow. With over 25 years of community leadership, Shana uses her lived experience to drive her work and has been recognized as one of Canadian Living Magazine’s 40 Women Change Makers.

Luciane O. Rocha has a B.A. in Social Sciences from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and M.A. and PhD in Anthropology from the University of Texas at Austin. She specializes in African & African Diaspora Studies and Gender & Women's Studies. Her PhD dissertation, titled “Outraged Mothering: Black Women, Racial Violence and the Power of Emotions in Rio de Janeiro’ African Diaspora," examines the activism of mothers whose lives have been affected by violence in Brazil. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor and program coordinator for the Black Studies program at Kennesaw State University.