Families & Households

Annotations:

• many generations due to increased life expectancy interdependence for child-care-social-care etc 

Annotations:

• when divorced or widowed people come together, step parents/step children

1. function of the family
   1. Murdock

      Annotations:

      • Sex reproduction economic educational - socialising children 
      1. Parsons

         Annotations:

         • Socialisation of children Stabilisation of adults support and security and reliance creates positive adult personalities.  

1. economic function Fletcher

   Annotations:

   • new functions for the economy such as consumption of goods   Important role in supporting the state - education, health, etc 

1. Engels
   1. passing wealth to sons
2. Zaretsky
   1. unpaid labour in the home supports capitalism

1. radical feminist
   1. family used by men to dominate women

      Annotations:

      • believe that women should live away from men 'Political lesbianism' to fight the male control  
      1. criticism

         Annotations:

         • domination and violence is exaggerated.  ignores positive narratives 
2. marxist feminist
   1. women are exploited

      Annotations:

      • as workers - low paid low status jobs and as wives Men have financial power fight for more economic power for women 
      1. criticism

         Annotations:

         • simplistic view of economic factors
3. liberal fem
   1. inequality in society

      Annotations:

      • women still bear the burden of household tasks (triple burden) and raising children   
   2. socialisation perpetuates

      Annotations:

      • socialisation of children within tradition nuclear families perpetuates stereotypes of male and female roles. Sterotypes should be challenged 

1. reasons for increase

   Annotations:

   • change in laws   Increasing financial independence for women through work and access to welfare   Higher expectation of marriage Longer life expectancy less social stigma   
   1. conflict between spouses

      Annotations:

      • Goode: nuclear family places too much burden - intense reliance Allan and Crowe : 2001 less economic reliance on each other ( 2 incomes?)   women's independance
   2. law changes
      1. 1857 - divorce if there's adultry
      2. 1950 - cruelty or desertion
      3. 1971 - breakdown of relationship
      4. 1984 - divorce within 1 year
      5. 1996 - mediation encouraged

         Annotations:

         • couples encouraged to entr a period of mediation aimed at supporting stability of marriages and reducing divorce 
2. statistics

   Annotations:

   • average ages 41(w) 43(m)   duration of marriage 11.5yrs 67% instigated by women 
3. theorists view

   Annotations:

   •  -  
   1. PM

      Annotations:

      • divorce is symptomatic oof the varied and changing nature of the modern family  'diverse - fluid family' Judith Stacey.  
   2. Fu & NR

      Annotations:

      • Divorce and breakdown of family is negative for society creates poverty and underclass welfare dependence fatherless families create social problems and criminality  
   3. Fem

      Annotations:

      • divorce offers women an escape from violence and reliance on men. welcome the development of divorce law to make it easier  Nicholson: women are better off outside of nuclear families. single women live longer than married women 

1. migration

   Annotations:

   • EU membership means workers free to move around EU to economic prosperity. Currently IMmigration is high.  Migration usually for work. Push and pull factors  political stability/economic/social ease and affordability of transport 
2. birthrate

   Annotations:

   • in general has been FALLING  availability of contraceptives Women working and delaying starting families to establish careers decline in mariage availability of abortion 
   1. effect of immigration

      Annotations:

      • in areas of high immigration there can be seen a 'blip' of higher birthrates.  immigrants often of a culture where larger families are the norm Immigrants tend to be move around the age that they would also want to start a family.  
3. life expectancy

   Annotations:

   • declining death rate infant mortality  LOW   maternal mortality LOW life expectancy : 1901: 45      2009 - 77 (boys) 1901: 49       2009 - 82 (girls  
   1. reasons

      Annotations:

      • medicine: antibiotics - vaccination programs - public health and hygiene Improved nutrition. decline in absolute poverty free school meals welfare benefits BUT.... increase in 'disease of affluence' heart disease and diabetes caused by easy availability of cheap calories 

1. nuclear (post industrial)

   Annotations:

   • people living in smaller family units - parents + children Requires one person to take responsibility for the home 
   1. modern symmetrical

      Annotations:

      • shared roles with both parties working and sharing household and parenting responsibilities
      1. arguments for

         Annotations:

         • women in work are less reliant on men Shared roles mean more equal status for all 2 parties working means higher living standards, reduced povery 
      2. criticisms

         Annotations:

         • feminists claim there is now a dual or triple burden (Oakley) with uneven distribution of work   Women's work - often caring work or service industry jobs are viewed as lower status than traditional male roles. Marxist feminist would see the modern symmetrical family as a middle-class phenomenon   Women's careers held back by family responsibilities more than mens still.   
   2. arguments in support

      Annotations:

      • greater mobility - a small unit to move to where the work is Families more stable as the partners must rely on each-other for all their needs   Increased wealth and social mobility within these families Focus on 'meritocracy' - achieving by YOUR OWN ENDEAVOURS. rather than relying on family connections.    
   3. criticism

      Annotations:

      • created a vulnerable and compliant workforce, isolated from family support (Marxists)     Women are dependents and trapped in marriages. (Feminist) 
2. arguments in support

   Annotations:

   • Parsons identified the extended family as the default family pre-industrial Willmott and Young also describe this in terms of pre-industrialisation.  
3. criticism

   Annotations:

   • Laslett found no evidence to support that idea that extended families were the norm in this period. 

Annotations:

• Changing patterns of marriage   Marriage declining social acceptable to co-habit secularisation - less religion more individualism - reliance and focus on self and goals of self fulfillment.  

1. decreasing
   1. secularisation
   2. changing social attitudes

      Annotations:

      • no stigma
   3. women have careers
2. gay marriage now accepted

Annotations:

• free nursery education used as a social lever to get families into work

1. free school meals
2. free childcare places

   Annotations:

   • gets familes back to work

Annotations:

• tax cuts for married people - to encourage marriage

1. tax cuts for marriage
   1. tax credit for working families

Annotations:

• should single parents be offered priority housing? 

Annotations:

• changes in life expectancy AND birth rate traced to health and werlfare policy

1. free contraception
2. abortion
3. no absolute poverty
4. NHS

1. social policy should give LESS support to single parent familes
   1. to encourage nuclear famliy
      1. SPF cause of crime and inequality
         1. criticism
            1. hard to establish 'cause'

               Annotations:

               • as many single parent families are also in poverty it is hard to argue that the family status rather than the poverty is the cause of the problems of the 'underclass'
            2. women would be more trapped in bad relationships
   2. the underclass

1. many aspects still support nuclear family 'ideal

   Annotations:

   • school hours assume a parent will be home.   there is an expectation of family care for older family memebers - this role falls to women 

1. 30% of all violent crime is domestic abuse

   Annotations:

   • 89% of incidences are where a woman is a victim of a man

Annotations:

• only recently recognised - can be financial power or isolating people from support

Annotations:

• rape within marriage now accepted as crime (since 1991) But hard to prosecute and deal with 

1. neglect

1. Wyness 2006

   Annotations:

   • a natural and inevitable phase of life
   1. criticism
      1. social construction?
         1. child soldiers?

            Annotations:

            • childhood not universal
         2. cultures where children work

            Annotations:

            • Samoan children historically, many cultures 
         3. Philippe Aries

            Annotations:

            • childhood did not exist before 16th century   EVIDENCE  chronological age not considered significant children expected to do work as soon as physically able no specialist clothes for children existed children not regarded as sexually innocent   
            1. evaluation

               Annotations:

               • limited study - French aristocracy (records for the working masses would not have existed!) No consideration that there was a concept of childhood, just different from our own. Judging from a 20th century perspective 

1. simple
   1. adult is complex
2. amoral
   1. adult- moral
3. asocial
   1. adult - social
4. becoming
   1. adult- being

1. Role of 'Mother'
   1. status of women attached to parenting

      Annotations:

      • women judged on parenting means greater emphasis placed on nurturing and socialising children
      1. feminist criticise
2. Edward Shorter
   1. romanticism 18th C
      1. children the result of a special relationship
3. education
   1. role of the state in education
      1. childhood conforms to more social norms
4. post modernity
   1. Jenks
      1. unstable society emphasises need for parental bonds

Annotations:

• universal institution social group consisting of adults with a socially approved sexual relationship and one or more children. common residence, economic co-operation 

1. The Nayar (Gough)

   Annotations:

   • This tribe disproves Murdock's 'universality' notion of the family.  No recognisable family structure  
2. matriarchal families (Gonzalez / Core)

   Annotations:

   • Carribean and Central America have large proportion of familes headed by just women.  Yanina Core argues women+children is the basic, default family unit