Dear Mamas & Magic Makers What if I told you the "Black single mother problem" might not actually be about Black mothers? What if everything you thought you knew about Black single motherhood came with a side of patriarchy, poverty, politics, and somebody else's agenda? And what if the "nuclear family" isn't the only family structure worth defending? Those are the questions we explore with our guest writer, cultural critic, and author Jamilah Lemieux, whose book Black Single Mother: Tales of Longing and Belonging, the book she spent years bringing into the world, takes a sledgehammer to the stereotypes surrounding Black moms. The book is an exploration of Black motherhood, identity, and the stories we inherit about what a "good" family is supposed to look like. And underneath all of it is a bigger question: What becomes possible when Black mothers no longer have to prove that their families are worthy of respect? Jamilah was our very first guest on the podcast, so this is a full-circle moment for us. And in her return to the podcast, she discusses why she initially rejected the idea of writing about Black single motherhood, what she discovered during her writing process, and what she learned from 21 Black single mothers whose co-parenting experiences ranged from truly equitable arrangements to fathers who were essentially absent. But this conversation isn't just about dismantling old narratives. It's about imagining something better. Jamilah talks about Black family structures, matrilineal traditions, Black love, healing between Black men and Black women, and what could happen if Black women's struggles were understood as Black people's struggles rather than problems women are expected to solve alone. We dive into: ✨The history behind the stereotypes and how ideas about Black families have been repeated, reshaped, and weaponized across generations. ✨The difference between sharing custody and sharing the labor of raising a child ✨Unlearning "baby mama" shame & the cost of making mamas the villain when children struggle ✨Media, the meaning of family, and what if Black single mothers stopped treating their families as something they have to explain PLUS - Stick around till the end for our signature 'Black Mama Say' segment, where we put our own twist on phrases from Black Mamas. This episode, the phrase we're twisting is "At the end of the day." ABOUT Jamilah Lemieux Connect with Jamilah Lemieux: Book | Instagram | Threads | Website A renowned cultural critic and writer focused on issues of race, gender, and motherhood, Jamilah Lemieux is a leading millennial feminist thinker, social influencer, and game-changing media maverick. Lemieux's written work has been featured EVERYWHERE via a host of print and digital platforms, including the LA Times, Essence, Playboy, the Cut, the Guardian, Colorlines, Wired, Self, Refinery 29, the Columbia Journalism Review, the Nation and Vanity Fair. She penned the foreword for the 2015 anniversary of Michele Wallace's Black Macho and the Myth of the Superwoman and the 2017 re-release of Ann Petry's Miss Muriel and Other Stories. She was also featured in the 2019 anthology How We Fight White Supremacy. Currently, she pens a weekly advice column for Slate's 'Care and Feeding' parenting section. She serves as the Editor-in-Chief for Still Here, a special single-issue magazine about Black women and HIV/AIDS, which will be released in 2026. She has appeared as a commentator on various news programs for CNN, ABC, CBS, BET, Buzzfeed, MTV2, and MSNBC, as well as Comedy Central's 'The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore' and 'The Daily Show with Trevor Noah'. After years of calling for accountability for the famed R&B singer known for his mistreatment of underage girls and women, she was prominently featured in Lifetime's critically acclaimed docuseries, Surviving R. Kelly (2019) and Surviving R. Kelly 2: The Reckoning (2020.) She served as both a producer and commentator for Time of Essence (2023), a 5-part docuseries about the history of Essence magazine. Lemieux served as the Vice President of News and Men's Programming for iOne Digital, where she helped spearhead the creation of CASSIUS, a progressive digital lifestyle platform. Prior to that, she worked as the Senior Editor for EBONY magazine, where she played a key role in launching the publication's website in 2012 and modernizing the brand voice and identity. She served as the Communications and Engagement Strategist for Cynthia Nixon's campaign for governor of New York and as a Communications Strategist for Girls for Gender Equity, a leading grassroots organizing, advocacy, policy, and service delivery organization dedicated to centering youth of color within the racial and gender justice movement of the 21st century. She resides in Los Angeles. About the Book - Black Single Mother: Tales of Longing and Belonging . With her signature candid, humorous, and sometimes biting takes, Jamilah Lemieux suffers no fools while also courageously revealing the scars of her own parenting journey and search for self-acceptance in a world that hates "baby mamas." With particular verve and relatability—honed over many years among Black Twitter's most prominent voices—Lemieux centers the complex reality of Black single motherhood: uncertainty and fierceness alike. Black. Single. Mother. combines riveting personal essays, infused with whip-smart cultural and historical analysis, with twenty-one intimate first-person testimonies from a spectrum of Black single mothers. A long-overdue offering in celebration of the American matriarch most often maligned, Black. Single. Mother. sets out to inspire a new cultural and community dialogue about this powerful figure as one profoundly deserving of love, support, and respect. IMPORTANT CHURCH ANNOUNCEMENTS: Thursday, September 3rd: YOUTUBE LIVE "We Are The Ones: The Good News in Black Maternal Health September 14th - September 20th: National Birth Center Week: Birthing Love. Birthing Power. June 24th - June 30th - Black Mama Creative Week: The Weight & Wonder of Black Motherhood 💗 Black Mama Magic Card Deck: Card #24 "Time is always divine" 💗 Episode Playlist: Black Mama Magic Election Playlist EPISODES MENTIONS/RELEVANT TO THIS EPISODE: 🎙️DBM Ep 21: Black Feminist Mama - A Conversation w/ Jamilah Lemieux 🔗 Connect with Dem Black Mamas: YouTube | Email List | Instagram 🗣️Engage: This is a conversation. Speak back to us! Please share your thoughts about the episode using the hashtag #DemBlackMamas, DM us, or email us at magic@demblackmamas.com. To expand knowledge and combat misinformation and disinformation, we create a syllabus (s/o to Melissa Harris Perry), a list of references/sources for our listeners to dive into. This list includes any books, videos, podcasts, etc. that we've mentioned in the episode or that will help you gain a well-informed perspective. For our complete syllabus, check out our website: demblackmamas.com
