Don't Bring Home a White Boy: And Other Notions that Keep Black Women From Dating Out

Don't Bring Home a White Boy: And Other Notions that Keep Black Women From Dating Out Review

IN AN AGE WHEN AMERICA HAS EMBRACED a mixed-race president and a strong, independent black woman as first lady...when black women are on the move and more empowered than ever before...there remains one hot-button topic that stirs up cultural resistance and intensity of emotion like no other: interracial relationships -- or, specifically, when black women date or marry white men.

What is it about the black female/white male dynamic that sparks such controversy and depth of feeling? What keeps many single black women from exploring relationships outside of their race at a time when the pool of eligible black men is at an all-time low?

"Don't bring home a white boy" is the cultural message stamped deep into every black daughter, an enduring twenty-first-century taboo with origins dating back to the Civil War era, the turbulent Civil Rights decades, and beyond. Now at last there is an honest, eye-opening examination of this societal phenomenon that will resonate with women everywhere and give voice to all sides of the debate. Karyn Langhorne Folan, herself a black woman happily married to a white man, brings together historical, statistical, psychological, and personal perspectives in a groundbreaking book that boldly debunks the "notions" that can keep interracial dating off the table for many women, including:

After slavery, I could never date a white man...

My family would never accept him -- and his would never accept me...

White men don't find black women attractive unless they look like Halle...

Our biracial children would have no sense of identity...

It means I'm a sellout, or fi lled with self-hate...

We'd just be too different...

Filled with real-life anecdotes from, and interviews with, men and women of both races and informed by Folan's thorough and expansive research, Don't Bring Home a White Boy is both an invaluable contribution to the topic of interracial dating and a timely handbook to help women look beyond skin color in the quest to have all they deserve and desire in a life partner.