“Grove Hall is Bound to Explode”: Black/Brown Mother-Organizers and the Movement for Welfare Rights in Boston

• In Event: Motherwork in Praxis

Abstract

This paper examines how poor and working-class African American and Latina mothers navigated Boston’s “urban crisis” of the 1960s and 1970s, leading a grassroots movement for welfare rights that demanded adequate and respectful government assistance. Mothers on AFDC (Aid to Families with Dependent Children) forged overlapping intersectional racial and political identities, which were the basis of the movement organization, Mothers for Adequate Welfare (MAW). MAW’s movement sheds light on black/brown mothers' leading role in the city’s broader protests for racial justice and one of the earliest attempts at organizing beyond the black-white binary.

Presenter

• Tatiana M. F. Cruz, Lesley University