Family

• Functionalist view on family:

  Suggested sociologists:

  • Parsons
  • Young and Willmott
  • Murdock
  • Fletcher
• Functionalist view on family:

  Suggested sociologists:

  Key concepts and idea:

  • Nuclear family and traditional family values.
  • primary socialisation
  • sexual regulation
  • economic functions
  • reproductive functions
  • gender socialisations
• Functionalist view on family:

  Key concepts and ideas:

  • Instrumental and expressive roles
  • stabilisation of adult personality
  • privatised nuclear family
  • biological/ sexual division of labour
  • social and geographical mobility
  • march of progress
  • symmetrical family
• Marxist views on family:

  Suggested sociologists:

  • Engles
  • Zaretsky
  • Donzelot
  • Hochschild
• Marxist views on family:

  key concepts and ideas include:

  • primitive communism
  • exploitation
  • alienation
  • commodification
  • inheritance
• Marxist views on family:

  Key concepts and ideas:

  • safe haven
  • pester power
  • ideological state apparatus
  • policing the family
  • dominant ideology
  • reproducing workforce
• New Right views of family:

  Key concept and ideas include:

  • welfare dependency
  • underclass
  • conservative social policies
• New right views on family:

  Suggested sociologsts:

  • Charles Murray
• Feminist views of the family:

  Key concepts and idea:

  • liberal feminism
  • radical feminism
  • marxist feminism
  • intersectional feminism
  • patriachy
  • division of domestic labour
• Feminist views of the family:

  • dual burden
  • triple shift
  • reserve army of labour
  • power relationships
  • emotional labour
  • domestic violence
  • patriachal control
  • decision making
• Feminist views on the family:

  Suggested sociologist:

  • Benston
  • Oakley
  • Greer
  • Somervile
  • Delphy and Leonard
  • Ansley
• Post and late modernism view on the family:

  Key concepts and ideas:

  • Family diversity
  • same sex families
  • isolated nuclear family
  • romantic love
  • confluent love
• Post and late modern view on the family:

  Key concepts and ideas include:

  • Pure relationship
  • reflexivity
  • plastic sexuality
  • individualisation thesis
  • individualisation thesis
  • divorce-extended family
• Post and late modernism view on the family:

  Suggested sociologists:

  • Giddens
  • Beck
  • Beck-Gernsheim
  • Stacey
  • Bauman
• Marriage & households: Family types:

  • extended family
  • beanpole family
  • traditional nuclear family
  • neo conventional family
  • same sex families
  • single person households
  • modified extended family
  • commune family
  • patriachal family
  • matriachal family symmetrical family
  • recomstituted family
  • lone parent family
• marriage & households: Newbold et al 2008

  • 'a household refers to a person living alone or a group of people living together who may or may not be related to each-other'
  • For example a group of students are a household but not a family.
• marriage & households: Rapoport 1982

  • identified that the nuclear family was no longer the dominant family in the UK.
  • instead the family had evolved into a range of alternatives.
  • they celebrated this diversity as they believed people ca n n iw choose the type of family life they wish to lead.
• marriage & households: Robert Chester 1985

  Critique of the Rapoports:

  • the nuclear family is the most common
  • many single parent families begun as a nuclear family
  • many people are singletons, however they will eventually marry
  • many who are single were married
  • cohabiting couples tend to marry
  • according to Chester, family diversity has been exaggerated
• marriage & households: nuclear family

  • a family consisting of an adult male and female with one or more children, own or adopted.
• marriage & households: extended family

  • a family containing relatives in addition to the nuclear family.
• marriage & households:

  Monogamy

  • marriage involving 2 adults one of each sex.

  Polygamy

  • system of marriage involving 2 or more husbands/ wives.

  Polygyny

  • marriage involving 2 or more wives.

  Polyandry

  • marriage involving 2 or more husbands
• marriage & households: Murdock 1949, is the family universal

  • functionalist view
  • studied 250 societies ranging from small hunting to large scale industrial societies.
  • "the family is a social group characterised by common resudence, economic cooperation and reproduction.
  • it includes adults of both sexes, at least two of whom maintain a socially approved relationship, and one or more children, own or adopted of the sexually cohabiting adults".
• marriage & households: marriage patterns

  • fewer people are marrying.
  • in 2005 there were 170,800 first marriages, less than half the number of 1970.
  • however there are more remarriages.
  • in 2005, 4 in 10 marriages were re marriages.
  • couples are less likely to marry in a church.
  • in 1981, 60% of weddings were conducted with religious ceremonies.
  • in 2005 this dropped to 35% people are marrying later.
• marriage & households: marriage and age

  • the average age for men to marry is 32 and 29 for a woman.
  • young people are spending longer time in full time education.
  • younger people choose to cohabitate before they marry.
• marriage & households: the relationship between marriage and cohabitation

  • cohabitation is used as a trial marriage Robert chester 1985 sa9d that cohabitation is the process of getting married.
  • coast 2006 found that 75% of cohabiting couples expect to marry each other.
  • cohabitation is a temporary phrase because one or both parners are awaiting a divorce.
  • Morgan 2003 sees it as part of a trend in which marriage is goung out of fashion cohabitation is in part the reason for the increase in sexual partners.
• marriage & households: Andre Behjin 1985- cohabitation is used as an alternative to marriage:

  • argues that cohabitation among some young people representts a conscious attempt to create a more personally negotiated and equal relationship than conventional patrichal marriage.
• childhood: social construction

  • a behaviour or practise which is produced by society.
  • something that is manmade
  • gender, identity, age and childhood are examples of social constructs according to sociologists.
• childhood: Jane Pilcher 1995

  • claimed that the most important feature of childhood is separateness.
  • childhood is viewed as a clear and distinct life stage and children occupy a separate status from adults.
• childhood: Stephan Wagg 1992

  • childhood is socially constructed.
  • it is, in other words, what members of particular societies, at particular times and in particular places, say it is.
  • there is no universal childhood experienced by all.
  • so, childhood isn't natural and should be distinguished from mere biological immaturity.
• childhood: aries 1975

  • the 20th century has become the age of the child. i.e. families, and society in general, have become 'child centred' the position of children has vastly improved since the middle ages.
• childhood: cross cultural differences in childhood

  • anthropologist Ruth Benedict 1934 argues that children in simpler non industrial societies are generally treated differently from their modern western counter parts in three ways:

  1. they take responsibility at an early age
  2. less value is placed on children showing obedience to adult authority
• grandparents: sandwich generation:

  • people in their 50s, who are supporting elderly parents, their children and even their grandchildren at the same time.
• grandparents: third age:

  • a period of active retirement when people may be healthy, but no longer work full time.
• grandparents: elder abuse:

  • actions intending to harm and the neglect that leads to the harm of older people.
• Marxist Explanations of the Family


  Key terms and ideas of the Marxist approach to families
• One in 14 babies 'raised by fathers' – study
• Despite pressures facing young families, parents take precious moments to play with their babies
• Marxism


  Key principles within Marxism
• Key principles within Marxism


  • Suppression of the W/C
  • Dominant Ideology
  • False Class Consciousness
• Karl Marx (1818-1883)


  Marxist theorist