The extended family today

• Charles (2008) study of Swansea

  • Found the classic 3 generations all living together family is essentially extinct, with the only exceptions being in the Bangladeshi community
• Willmott (1988)


  • Argues relatives are apart geographically but are still in contact via visits/phone calls
• Chamberlain (1999) studies Caribbean families


  • Despite them being dispersed by location, they would always provide support: multi-nuclear families
• Chamberlain


  The extended family is still here performing important functions of remembers
• Bell (1968)


  • Families support their kin, like the MC having more financial help from father to son, and WC families having frequent contact and domestic help between mother and daughter
• Seeing the extended family among ethnic minorities means we want to see how widespread this family type is in the UK today, as Parsons argues that when we moved to modern Industrial society, we replaced it with the nuclear family
• Beanpole family


  A type of extended family, extends vertically through 3+ generations of grandparents, parents & children, but doesn't extend horizontally - no aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.
• Beanpole family


  • Comes from demographic changes: Increased life expectancy- more grandparents/great-grandparents, Smaller family sizes-less siblings, less horizontal ties
• Obligations to relatives


  • Even with family types like beanpole, people feel the obligation to help their wider kin
• Finch & Mason (1993)


  • 90% of people have given/received family financial help, and 50% cared for a sick relative
• Obligations to relatives


  • More expected of women than of men, daughters/daughters-in-law were often the first pick for caring for the old, domestic help, etc.
• Functionalists argue that in modern society the nuclear family replaces the extended family
• Willmott (1988) found that the extended family still exists as a dispersed extended family, where relatives maintain frequent contact
• The 'beanpole' family is extended vertically through three generations, but not horizontally - it doesn't involve aunts, cousins etc. It is partly the result of increased life expectancy and smaller family sizes
• Many people still feel obligation to their wider extended kin
• Reciprocity (balance) is important - people felt that help received should be returned
• The extended family continues to perform important functions, e.g. financial and domestic help. However, this is very different from Parsons' classic extended family, whose members lived together and were bound by strong mutual obligations
• Changing family patterns are leading to greater family diversity- a wider range of family types, rather than just the dominance of the nuclear family