Exploring ‘Whose Child Are You?’
“I write because I was called ‘nobody’ for too long—an illegitimate orphan, a child born out of wedlock, a girl dismissed as ‘too talkative’ by teachers who saw only my black skin and social status, not my potential.” Yvonne Bobb-Smith’s memoir, Whose Child Are You? (2025), written in her 90s after surviving breast cancer, is, for want of a better phrase, something else: it speaks to any woman who has been dealt a hard hand, because the optimism it offers is grounded in what has been endured and worked through over time, never turning away from difficulty, showing with clarity and restraint how a life may still be shaped within its limits, and leaving intact the recognition that however difficult the beginning, the capacity for hope remains.
How her writing journey started - A Sunday School in Belmont where Bobb-Smith waited to be called to the stage and listened as other names were read; a classroom where her marks were high and a teacher reduced her to a single line—too talkative—and silenced her when she tried to explain herself, making her wonder how much of how she was treated had to do with her dark skin. Bobb-Smith writes from the accumulation of a life spent working through hurt with grit, with a clear recognition of what has been overcome and a determination not to be deterred from her right to inhabit the beauty and wonder of the world.
Success came, but it took its toll. “I write because at 90 years old, I could no longer carry untold stories inside me,” she says, recalling Maya Angelou. The pressure is felt as a physical weight, one that has built over time and requires release. The decision to begin came after a student at COSTAATT recognised something in the way Bobb-Smith taught, in the way she used experience to explain culture. “I realised that telling my story amounted to an analysis of identity and interconnectedness,” she writes, “a narrative of self-definition that says I am a woman who believes life is a search to be the best you can be.”
The memoir holds that line between the personal and the shared. Bobb-Smith writes to honour Caribbean women—her mother, trained as an operating theatre nurse in the 1930s; the grandmothers who raised her; Mama Glory, whose words remain in the book as a way of thinking through life. “These women deserve to have their stories told,” she says, “their contributions acknowledged.” Her own life is remarkable, given her difficult start in life. A degree in library science from the University of Toronto in 1963. A return to Trinidad and Tobago in 1966, where Bobb-Smith established the country’s medical library system.
Work in public relations and national development. Years in Canada, where she co-founded the Ebo Society. Teaching across institutions in both countries. A doctorate completed at sixty-eight, based on the lives of Caribbean women. Bobb-Smith describes what sustained her in a phrase that recurs through the book: “micro-resilience.” She explains it as “the small, daily acts of resistance and survival that compound over time into transformation,” the hard work of pushing back at the terms set by others. Her students remain part of the frame through which Bobb-Smith understands the memoir. “My students loved to examine present concepts through past stories,” she writes, and the book follows that method. It also carries a concern with the present—“the erosion of values, the minimalising of ethics”—set alongside what she names as sustaining forces: relationships, community, culture, and self-love.
Having survived breast cancer five times, Bobb-Smith is clear-eyed about what remains. “It’s never too late,” she says. “Never too late to tell your truth. Never too late to claim your identity.” The question in the title has been answered almost a century after her birth. “I know whose child I am.”
Extract From Whose Child Are You? (2025) (Self- Published by the Author Yvonne Bobb-Smith)
Fitting in with Outsiders – Childhood
It was interesting that my first public experience of rejection took place between six and eight years of age at Gospel Hall Sunday School on Erthig Road in Belmont, quite close to my home. Sunday School gave youngsters an extra day to socialise with others and make friends. Yet, I cannot recall any interaction with the girls and boys I met there. I would have liked to take part in the end-of-term performance, yet I was never called out. My strategy was to get the pastor and Sunday School teachers to acknowledge my regularity in the class, coupled with my deliverance of weekly religious texts.
Therefore, on this particular Audition Sunday I stayed behind with hope and certainty because, having practised at home, I was well prepared to recite when I was called. However, I heard name after name called – boys and girls who went on stage, giggling and shuffling with Pastor Clark’s guidance. I worried as it was getting dark outside, nearly 6 pm, but I never heard “Yvonne Bobb”. While I was in a daze of disbelief, I looked up to see Dah, one of my Grans, looking annoyed at the church door. She beckoned me to come. I took my time. I got up, pouting, and tried to resist her grasp.
Just then, Pastor Clark approached and enquired about what transpired. I spoke up clearly and told him, “You have not called my name. I am Yvonne Bobb. I want to take part in the concert.” He grinned and asked me, “What can you do?” What I could do? Promptly, I replied. “I could recite a poem, Rumpelstiltskin O, a poem from Grimm’s Fairy Tales. He led me to the stage. I took a deep breath and spoke with a confident and clear voice: “To-day I bake, to-morrow I brew, The next day, I will the young queen’s child take Ha, glad I am that no one would ever know that I, I am Rumpelstiltskin O.” The pastor smiled, shook my hand and led me off the stage, where I exchanged his hold for that of my Gran’s.
As soon as we exited, she said in a sort of a scream, “Wha kinda people dese white people is at all… yuh cryin?” “No!” I quickly replied, “Gran, what is white people?” She answered, “Big people bizness!” There were no tears, just a limp feeling as I left the church. She, on the other hand, from the way she was slightly puffing, was very annoyed. As if “Is vex ah vex” was being said under her breath. However, as young as I was, I felt I had done well, and my only hope was that I would get another chance. I looked back and beyond, and a picture of children with white and brown skins rose in my sight. In my recollection, the church was all painted in white in the 1940s. I felt somewhat empty; I touched my hair, looked at my arm, and wondered if it were those parts of my body which gave me trouble (physiognomy). I began to think the reason for my exclusion was because of my looks. Those selected for places in the concert had light, or red or brown skin, hair often loose, and slim bodies. I was different looking – darkskinned, with thick, plaited hair and a bit chubby. Plus, those living on Erthig Road had big, filigree-decorated houses; a few had cars and servants, while I lived in a chattel house, which could be moved. A post-emancipation strategy used by the working class.”
End of Extract by author Yvonne Bobb-Smith