We briefly discussed before on the roles women played towards the migration. Ho’s Caribbean Transnationalism as a Gendered Process further explores this idea. Caribbean households tended to be matrifocal, which refers to the patterns of relationship that puts emphasis on women. This doesn’t mean that women lead the household, but that the Caribbean households value the mother-child bond deeply. Along with this matrifocality, Caribbean culture sanctions separated gender roles. Mothers may not always have someone to help her support and raise the family, which is why many enter the workforce. However, a majority of the immigrant women have low education, and were left with low-paying, low-skilled jobs. They were often seen as a reserve to the labor pool. As a result of unemployment and low wages, women couldn’t support their families by themselves. Many engaged in relationships with multiple men to gain financial support for their family.

Identity becomes a big issue after 1965, when Afro-Caribbean once again migrates to the states in large numbers. Although the segregation ended, white American views of black Americans did not change. The afro-Caribbean group and the native black group had strong identity views. When Caribbean migrants came to the states in large numbers, both groups started to have conflict with each other. They didn’t want to be viewed as similar to each other. This divide was further separated by how white-Americans viewed both groups in the working environment. Caribbean immigrants in the job force was favored over the native blacks because they were viewed as being better educated than their native counterparts. At the same time, these two groups were brought together by these views. Both the native black groups and afro-Caribbean groups had common ancestry in the Africa, and a common skin. People who have saw Caribbean migrants as the model minority made comments that showed their ignorance. They thought that they were automatically better than the blacks. The ignorance behind comments like these enraged many people. It is people like these that continue to maintain the color line.