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Family Diversity - Coggle Diagram
Family Diversity
Postmodernism and family diversity
Postmodernists such as Cheal (1993) - no longer live in a 'modern' society with predictable, orderly structures but society has entered a new, chaotic, postmodern stage
No longer one single dominant stable family structure but family structures have become fragmented into many different types and individuals now have more choice in lifestyle, personal relationships and family arrangements
Diversity and choice brings advantages and disadvantages:
greater freedom to plot their own life course - choose kind of family and personal relationships that meet their needs
greater risk of instability
Stacey: postmodern families:
Greater freedom and choice has benefited women - enabled free themselves of patriarchal oppression and shape family arrangements to meet their needs
Life history interviews construct series of case studies of postmodern families in Silicon Valley, California - women rather than men main agents of changes in the family
Many interviewees rejected traditional housewife-mother role - worked, returned to education as adults, improved job prospects, divorces, remarried - created new types of families to meet their needs
'Divorce extended family' - connected by divorce
Pam Gamma - married young, divorced, cohabited before remarrying. Second husband also previously married
By children 20 form def with Shirley (first husbands cohabitant) - helped each other financially and domestically
Postmodern families diverse and shape depends on active choices about how to live their lives
Morgan (1996;2011) - pointless trying to make large-scale generalisations about 'the family', family is now chosen
The individualisation thesis:
Giddens and Back - effects of increased individual choice upon families and relationships
Traditional social structures (class, gender, family) have lost influence over us - today fewer certainties and fixed rules to follow
Become freed or 'disembedded' from traditional roles and structures = more freedom choose how we live our lives
Beck (1992) - 'standard biography' or life course previously followed replaced by 'do-it-yourself biography'
Giddens: choice and equality:
Family and marriage transformed by greater choice and more equal relationship between men and women - due to:
contraception - sex and intimacy rather than reproduction to become main reason for relationship's existence
women gained independence as a result of feminism and greater opportunities in education and work
Basis marriage and family changes - today's couples can define their relationship themselves - don't have to marry to have children, divorce accessible no 'til death do us part'
The pure relationship:
What holds a relationship together no longer law, religion, social norms, traditional institutions but intimate relationships now based on individual choice and equality
Pure relationship - exist solely to satisfy each partner's needs, survive as long as both partners think it's in their best interest to do so - stay together because of love, happiness, sexual attraction not tradition, duty, children
Relationships become part of individual's self-discovery or self-identity
More choice can cause less stability. Pure relationship like a 'rolling contract' can be ended at the will of either partner = greater family diversity by creating more lone-parents, one person, step families etc
Same-sex couples as pioneers:
Leading towards new family types and creating more democratic and equal relationships
Not influenced by tradition - develop relationships based on choice
Negotiate personal relationships and actively create family structures that serve their own needs
Weston (1992) - same-sex couples created supportive 'families of choice' from among friends, former lovers and biological kin
Weeks (2000) - friendship networks functioned as kinship networks for gay men and lesbians
Beck: the negotiated family:
Live in a 'risk society' - tradition less influence and people have more choice = more aware of risks - making choices means calculating risks and rewards of options
Traditional patriarchal family unequal and oppressive did provide stable and predictable basis for family life by defining roles and responsibilities - undermined by two trends:
greater gender equality - challenged male dominated in all spheres of life - women expect equality in work and marriage
greater individualism - actions influenced by calculations of own self-interest than obligation to others
New family type replace patriarchal
Beck and Beck-Gernsheim (1995) - 'negotiated family' - vary according to wishes and expectations of members, decide what's best through negotiation, enter relationship on an equal basis
Less stable - free to leave if needs aren't met = greater family diversity
The zombie family:
In uncertain risk society people turn to family for security but actually find greater risk and uncertainty
Beck - 'zombie family' - appears to be alive but is dead.
People want it to be a haven of security in an insecure world but today's family can't provide this due to it's own instability
The personal life perspective:
Smart (2007) and May (2013) - more family diversity but disagree B + G explanations
Criticisms individualisation thesis:
Exaggerates how much choice people have about family relationships
Budgeon (2011) - reflects neoliberal ideology that individuals have complete freedom of choice - reality traditional norms limit people's relationship choices haven't weakened as much as claimed
Wrongly sees people as disembedded, 'free-floating', independent individuals - ignores fact decisions and choices about personal relationships are made within a social context
Ignores importance of structural factors such as social class inequalities and patriarchal gender norms in limiting and shaping our relationship choices
May - G + B view of individual is simply 'an idealised version of a white MC man' - ignore fact not everyone has the same ability as this privileged group to exercise choice about relationships
The connectedness thesis:
Smart - we are fundamentally social beings whose choices are always made 'within a web of connectedness'
Live in networks of existing relationships and interwoven personal histories that strongly influence our range of options and choices in relationships
Finch and Mason (1993) - study extended families - although individuals can to some extent negotiate relationships they want they are also embedded within family connections and obligations that restrict their freedom of choice
Challenge notion of pure relationships - families usually include more than just couples Giddens focuses on, even couple relationships aren't always pure that we can walk away from at will
Smart - 'where lives have become interwoven and embedded, it becomes impossible for relationships to simply end' - importance of always putting individuals in context of their past and the web of relationships that shape their choices and family patterns
Class and gender:
Structures limit choices about kinds of relationships, identities and families we can create for ourselves
after divorce, gender norms generally dictate women should have custody of children - may limit opportunity to form new relationships - men freer to start new relationships and second families
men generally better paid giving them greater freedom and choice in relationships
relative powerlessness of women and children as compared to men means many lack freedom to choose and so remain trapped in abusive relationships
The power of structures:
May - structures (class, gender, family) not disappearing but being re-shaped
While women past 150 years gained important rights in relation to voting, divorce, education and employment, doesn't mean they now 'have it all'
While women pursue traditionally masculine goals they are still expected to be heterosexual
Einasdottie (2011) - while lesbianism now tolerated, heteronotmativity means lesbains feel forced to remain in the closet, limiting choices about relationships and lifestyles
Increased diversity not simply as a result of greater freedom of choice but emphasise importance of social structures in shaping freedoms many people now have to create more diverse types of families
Trend towards greater diversity and choice, emphasises continuing importance of structural factors such as patriarchy and class inequality in restricting people's choices and shaping their family lives
Modernism and the nuclear family
Functionalism:
Parsons: there's a functional fit between the nuclear family and modern society
Nuclear family is uniquely suited to meet standards of modern society for a geographically and socially mobile workforce, performs two irreducible functions (SOAP, primary socialisation) - contribute to stability and effectiveness of society
Family's ability to perform essential functions, generalise about type of family we will find in modern society - nuclear, division of labour between wife and husband
Other family types = dysfunctional, abnormal, deviant
New Right:
Conservative, anti-feminist view of family - opposed to family diversity
Family as 'natural', based on fundamental biological differences
Family cornerstone of society - refuge, contentment, harmony
Oppose changes in family patterns. Decline of traditional nuclear family and growth of family diversity cause of many societal problems
Growth lone-parent families, breakdown of couple relationships - harmful to children
Lone mothers cannot discipline children properly
Lone parent families leave boys without adult male role model = educational failure, delinquency, social instability
Poorer, burden welfare state and taxpayers
Cohabit v marriage:
Benson (2006) - analysed data on parents of over 15,000 babies - over first 3 years rate of family breakdown higher among cohabiting couples (20%) compared to marries (6%) - only marriage can provide stable environment to bring up children
Benson (2010;2011) - couples are more stable when married - rate divorce among married couples lower than breakups of cohabiting
Marriage more stable as requires deliberate commitment
NR and Conservative politicians used evidence to support view both family and society at large are broken
Argue only a return of traditional values, including marriage, can prevent social disintegration and damage to children
Regard laws and policies (easy access to divorce, gay marriage, widespread availability of welfare benefits) as undermining conventional family
Benson - gov needs to encourage couples to marry by means of policies that support marriage
Criticisms:
Feminist (Oakley, 1997) - wrongly assume husbands and wives roles are biologically fixed
Cross-cultural studies show variation in roles of men and women in family.
NR view of family is negative reaction against feminist campaign for women's equality
Feminists: conventional nuclear family favoured by NR based on patriarchal oppression of women and is fundamental cause of gender inequality - prevents women working, keeps them financially dependent on men, denies them equal say in decision making
No evidence children in lone parent more likely to be delinquent than those of two parent from same class
View marriage = commitment, cohab doesn't. Depends on meaning of relationship to those involved
Rate cohab higher among poorer social groups - Smart (2011) - may be poverty causing breakdown of relationships, not decision to marry
Chester: neo-conventional family:
Some increased family diversity recently, not significant or negative
Only important change move from dominance of traditional/conventional nuclear family to 'neo conventional family'
Dual-earner family, both work - similar to symmetrical family (Y + W)
Most not choosing to live in alternatives to nuclear on long-term basis, nuclear remains ideal and aspiration - stats misleading as only provide snapshot in time
Evidence little changed:
Most live in household headed by married couple
Most marry and have children, most children reared by two natural parents
Most marriages continue to death, divorce increased but many remarry
Cohab increased, most temporary before marriage. Most couples marry if have children
Births out marriage increased, most jointly registered
The Rapoports: five types of family diversity:
Diversity central importance in understanding family life today
Moved away from traditional nuclear to range of types
Families in Britian adapted to pluralistic society - cultures and lifestyles are more diverse
Family diversity - freedom of choice and acceptance of cultures and ways of life
Positive response to people's needs and wishes
5 types family diversity Britain today:
Organisational family - differences in way family roles are organised
Cultural diversity - different cultural, religious and ethnic groups have different family structures
Social class diversity - differences result of income differences between households of different classes
Life-stage diversity - structures differ according to stage reached in life cycle
Generational diversity - different gens have different attitudes and experiences reflecting historical period they lived