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Binding: PaperbackDewey Decimal Number: 306.874320869420974811 EAN: 9780520248199 Edition: 1 ISBN: 0520248198 Label: University of California Press Manufacturer: University of California Press Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 298 Publication Date: March 21, 2007 Publisher: University of California Press Studio: University of California Press Related Items:
Browse for similar items by category: Click to Display Editorial Review: Product Description: Millie Acevedo bore her first child before the age of 16 and dropped out of high school to care for her newborn. Now 27, she is the unmarried mother of three and is raising her kids in one of Philadelphia's poorest neighborhoods. Would she and her children be better off if she had waited to have them and had married their father first? Why do so many poor American youth like Millie continue to have children before they can afford to take care of them? Over a span of five years, sociologists Kathryn Edin and Maria Kefalas talked in-depth with 162 low-income single moms like Millie to learn how they think about marriage and family. Promises I Can Keep offers an intimate look at what marriage and motherhood mean to these women and provides the most extensive on-the-ground study to date of why they put children before marriage despite the daunting challenges they know lie ahead. Average Rating:
 Rating:  - Fantastic book about a not-so-fantastic phenomenonAs a social worker who deals with the population portrayed in this book day in and day out, I was very interested in reading a book that I hoped would help me understand a phenomenon that has intrigued me since the day I started my job. I was very pleased when I read this book as I thought that it did address its stated purpose in a factual but still thoughtful way. I enjoyed this book because the authors were able to keep away from giving the book a judgmental feel while still not appearing to ... Read More Rating: - Sets a high standard for ethnographic researchThe quotation from William Julius Wilson on the cover sounds "over the top," but it is not: "This is the most important study ever written on motherhood and marriage among low-income urban women." Edin and Kefalas set a high standard for ethnographic research. Unlike many other research projects, they did not simply "dip their feet into a flowing river" (with apologies to Heraclitus). They conducted hundreds of interviews among a diverse population over several years. One of them (Edin) actually lived ... Read More Rating:  - Sheds light on an important subjectThis book examines why poor women have children prior to being married. The authors did a years-long, very intense, ethnographic study of dozens of poor women of all races in some of the worst neighbrhorhoods of Philadelphia. The book is good. It is easy to read, and it maintains a nice balance between academic depth -- the authors are well read in their area, but are low key about it -- and engagement with their subjects. The authors care about these women, and that comes across. ... Read More Rating: - Promises I can Keep:I very much enjoyed reading 'Promises'. The depth of research is extensive. There is plenty of material here to draw your own conclusions or to append other research. My major criticism is the conflicting stories. I felt like I was reading a book written by ten different authors compiled by style in no particular order. I often felt a little sea sick. There is also a lot of redundancy. Nevertheless, there is a lot of useful original information. Rating: - Promises I Can KeepVery interesting from a social perspective. Not alot is written about this subject for the lay person. I found it quite insightful. 
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