Examines welfare-reliant, female heads of households and the barriers they face in their attempts to obtain employment. Almost all the Latina respondents spoke only Spanish and were born in South or Central America, Cuba, or the West Indies. The study challenges the assumptions on which the Temporary Assistance for Need Families operates, including its political origins and its current regulations that mandate time limits on assistance in spite of persistent national economic problems.
Although the Americas and Caribbean region are purported to comprise different ethnic groups, this article’s focus is on people of African descent, who represent the largest ethnic group in many countries. The emphasis on people of African descent is related to their family structure, ethnic identity, cultural, psychohistorical, and contemporary psychosocial realities. This article discusses the limitations of Western psychology for theory, research, and applied work on people of African descent in the Americas and Caribbean region.