I Am Not Your Baby Mother Book Summary - I Am Not Your Baby Mother Book explained in key points
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I Am Not Your Baby Mother summary

Candice Brathwaite

What it's like to be a Black British mother

3.9 (15 ratings)
24 mins

What is I Am Not Your Baby Mother about?

I Am Not Your Baby Mother (2020) is part memoir and part manifesto about life as a Black British mother. Drawing on Candice Brathwaite’s own journey to parenthood, it describes how she survived everything from postnatal depression to the realization that she could never protect her children from racism. These events motivated her to create space for representations of diverse experiences of motherhood online.

Table of Contents

    I Am Not Your Baby Mother
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    Key idea 1 of 9

    What's in it for me? Discover a refreshingly honest account of motherhood as a Black woman.

    When Candice Brathwaite found herself pregnant, she was ravenous for information about the parenting journey ahead. But she soon realized that, as a Black woman, she was completely missing from mainstream media representations of motherhood. She could only find negative representations that were steeped in stereotypes and prejudice.

    While Candice could relate to some of the information from white “mummy bloggers” and book authors, a lot of what she found seemed to come from another planet. Black British mothers have worries that their white counterparts wouldn’t even imagine. Will they get the right medical care to survive childbirth? Will their newborn’s name prevent her from getting a job interview? How will they prepare their son to endure racist microaggressions or avoid being stabbed on the way to school? 

    In these blinks, you'll learn everything Candice wished she knew when she first became pregnant. If you're a Black parent-to-be, you'll gain insights from the authentic stories of someone who’s been there before. If you're white, you'll gain insights into how racial justice is still needed to fight inequality. 

    In these blinks, you’ll learn

    • why the stereotype of the “baby mother” is so harmful;
    • how medical negligence nearly led to Candice’s death after the birth of her daughter; and
    • why she became obsessed with acquiring a Bugaboo stroller at any cost.
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    About the Author

    Candice Brathwaite is the founder of Make Motherhood Diverse, a hugely popular campaign to make representations of motherhood in the media more representative. As a leading voice on modern motherhood, she has appeared on countless panels, and her writing has been featured in publications like Stylist, Metro, and the Huffington Post.

    Who should read I Am Not Your Baby Mother?

    • Black mothers looking for narratives of parenthood that more closely reflect their own
    • Activists wanting to learn more about inequality in Britain
    • White parents who want to confront their own privilege and learn about institutionalized racism

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