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Feminist view on Family - Coggle Diagram
Feminist view on Family
Criticise gender roles associated with the traditional nuclear family.
The nuclear family performs two roles that oppress women.
Gender is socially constructed.
Marxist Feminism
Women reproduce the labour force through unpaid domestic labour, socialising the next generation of workers, servicing the current workers.
All chores associated with the traditional, expressive role such as domestic labour (Reserve army), childcare and emotional work are necessary.
The capitalist system only pays one member of the family (the wage of the male breadwinner)
Ansley
The emotional support provided by men as a safety valve for the frustrations produced by the husband working in a capitalist.
The different but equal roles are actually different but unequal.
Ideological conditioning
Feeley argues family is an authoritarian unit dominated by the husband in particular and adults in general, teaching passivity, not rebellion and children learn to submit to parental authority.
Evaluations
Morgan argues that the traditional nuclear family is becoming less common and so this theory is less applicable today.
Women have made progress in family life.
Tackle capitalism to tackle the patriarchy, so problems should be tackled economically.
Women’s oppression was clearly in evidence before capitalism
Radical Feminism
Men are the causes of women’s exploitation and oppression, so the entirety needs to be overturned.
Greer Family continues to disadvantage women.
There is a strong ideology that being a wife is the most important female role.
Yet society does not attach a lot of value to motherhood (e.g during childbirth, duration of maternity leave, regaining of body figure, mothers are blamed in result of their child being bad)
Daughters are likely to experience sexual abuse from fathers, and other male relatives
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Evaluations
Sommerville argues that she does not take into account women’s progress
Greer makes generalisations not backed up by evidence.
They argue that paid work has not been liberating, acquiring the ‘dual burden’.
Furthered by the ‘triple shift’. Duncombe and Marsden
Dark side of the family
1 in 4 women will experience domestic violence at some point in their lifetime and women are much more likely to experience this than men.
Dobash and Dobash families can be a violent group.
A family is both a mirror and a connection with the larger society.
Advocate for political lesbianism, matrimonial families and women only communes.
Evaluations
Women less likely to suffer dual burden and triple shift.
ME TOO campaign proves it is still relevant to highlight that harassment and sexual abuse still exist.
Liberal Feminism
Somerville
Suggests policy reform rather than revolutionary change to improve family life for women.
Argues many feminists have ignored the progress for women such as greater freedom to go into paid work.
The increased choice has created greater equality in relationships.
She also suggests some women might Dow its out male partners retrieving their satisfaction from their children, but does not believe living in a household without a male is the answer.
HEterosexual families will not disappear, evident in the high rates of remarriage.
A level of man’s incompetency means that high rates of relationship breakdowns will remain.
Praised policy aimed at working parents.
The working hours of many jobs are incompatible with family life.
Hence an increased flexibility in paid employment is required.
Evaluations
More appealing than radical ideas, as well as more practical
The system would accept small policy changes
Not backed up by empirical evidence.
Argue it is an ethnocentric view (difference feminists)