Families and Households Theorists

Question 1

What is stated by Murdock in his study entitled ‘Social Structure’?

Answer 1

“The nuclear family is a universal human social grouping. Either as the sole prevailing form of the family or as the basic unit from which more complex forms are compounded”

Question 2

What is Parsons argument on primary socialisation?

Answer 2

Primary socialisation refers to socialisation during the early years of childhood, of which children internalise society’s culture and structure personalities. Parsons argued that families are ‘factories’ which produce human personalities. He believed they are essential for this purpose, conceiving of no institution other than the family to provide this.

Question 3

What is Parsons argument on the stabilisation of adult personalities?

Answer 3

Family provides a context in which a husband and wife can express their childish whims, give and receive emotional support, recharge their batteries and stabilise personalities. Parsons uses the example of the father being ‘kept in the rails’ by playing with his son’s train set.

Question 4

What did Eli Zaretsky analyse in the developments of the family?

Answer 4

He analysed developments in the family in industrial societies from a Marxist perspective. The family within modern capitalist society creates the illusion that the private life of the family is separate from the economy.

Question 5

Why does Zaretsky claim the family was put on a pedestal?

Answer 5

In a society in which work was alienating, Zaretsky claims the family was put on a pedestal because it ‘stood in opposition to the terrible anonymous world of commerce and industry’.

Question 6

What is the family unable to provide according to Zaretsky?

Answer 6

The family is unable to provide for the psychological and personal needs of individuals. He says, ‘it simply cannot meet the pressures of being the only refuge in a brutal society’. Therefore, it might cushion the effects of capitalism but cannot compensate for the general alienation produced by such a society.

Question 7

What does Somerville (2000) argue Zaretsky underestimates and over exaggerates?

Answer 7

Zaretsky exaggerates the importance of the family as a refuge from life in capitalist societies. She suggests the Zaretsky underestimates the ‘extend of cruelty, violence, incest and neglect’ within families. Yet, exaggerates the extent to which family life is separated from work.

Question 8

What does Fran Ansley (1972) translate?

Answer 8

Ansley translates Parsons’s view that the family functions to stabilise adult personalities into a Marxist framework. She sees the emotional support provided by the wife as a safety valve for the frustration produced in the husband by working in a capitalist system.

Question 9

What does Fran Ansley state in ‘Bernard’ 1976?

Answer 9

“When wives play their traditional role as takers of shit, they often absorb their husbands legitimate anger and frustration at their own powerlessness and oppression. With every worker provided with a sponge to soak up his possible revolutionary ire”.

Question 10

What does David Cooper (1972) argue the family is?

Answer 10

The family is ‘an ideological conditioning device in an exploitative society’. Within the family, children learn to conform and submit to authority. The foundation is therefore laid for the obedient and submissive workforce required for capitalism.

Question 11

What does Diane Freely (1972) claim the structure of the family socialises?

Answer 11

The structure of family relationships socialises the young to accept their place in a class-stratified society. She sees the family as an authoritarian unit dominated by the husband in particular. The family’s ‘authoritarian ideology’ teaches passivity and a preconditioned acceptance for their place in the hierarchy of power.

Question 12

How does Morgan (1975) criticise Marxist and Functionalist perspectives?

Answer 12

Both presuppose a traditional model of the nuclear family where there is ‘a married couple with children, where the husband is the breadwinner and where the wife stays at home to deal with the housework’. The pattern is becoming increasingly less common and the critique of this type of family may therefore be becoming less important.

Question 13

Why does Greer (2000) believe the family disadvantages women as mothers?

Answer 13

“‘Mother’ is not a career option; the woman who gave her all to mothering has to get in shape, find a job, and keep young and beautiful if she wants to be loved. ‘Motherly’ is a word for people who are frumpish and suffocating, people who wear cotton hose and shoes with a small heel.”

Question 14

What does Somerville (200) believe within her liberal feminist ideas on heterosexual relationships?

Answer 14

Heterosexual attraction and the need for adult companionship means that heterosexual families will not disappear. However, nor will ‘the conflicts endemic to current inequalities in heterosexual relationships’. These will lead to more women cohabitating, living in non-family households or on their own.

Question 15

According to Calhoun (1997), why is exploitation only featured in heterosexual relationships?

Answer 15

In lesbian families, there is no possibility that women can become dependent on men and exploited by them. It is family life within heterosexual relationships which cause exploitation. Lesbian partners can develop forms of marriage and family life which can point to creating more egalitarian domestic relationships.

Question 16

What does Calhoun (1997) suggest family is essentially characterised by?

Answer 16

Family life is characterised by choice. Lesbian and gays introduced the idea of chosen families. However, heterosexuals also construct ‘chosen families’, as they divorce, remarry, adopt children, or gain stepchildren.

Question 17

What does Calhoun (1997) argue the two types of families have been used to scapegoat?

Answer 17

The two types of family outlaw who have been scapegoated and blamed are ‘the unwed welfare mother and the lesbian or gay whose mere public visibility threatens to undermine family values’. The scapegoating of lesbians and gays is used to disguise the increasingly frequent departures from the norms of family life by heterosexuals. Thus the ideology of the heterosexual family has played an important part in encouraging discrimination and prejudice.

Question 18

How does Parsons’s ‘isolated nuclear family’ reinforce the need for the stabilisation of adult personalities?

Answer 18

The structural isolation of the nuclear family consequently causes conjugal bonds to be strengthened between husband and wife. Without the support of kin beyond the nuclear family, spouses are increasingly dependent on each other, particularly for emotional support.

Question 19

What does Jamieson (2005) accuse Parsons of expressing?

Answer 19

Parsons was expressing ‘particular values rather than describing or advancing understanding of the ways in which lives were lived. In arguing that the roles performed within the nuclear family are functional, he was ignoring the way that they ‘were key mechanisms for sustaining gender inequalities and the subordination of women’.

Question 20

What is stated within Willmott and Young’s ‘The symmetrical family’?

Answer 20

Willmott and Young argue that the early industrial family had largely disappeared. They argue that a ‘symmetrical’ nuclear family predominates, characterised by the separation of immediate family from the extended, the ‘trade union of women is disbanded and the husband returns to the family circle. Wives still have the main responsibility for raising the children, although husbands help, they share decisions, chores and work together yet there is still a gender division on men’s work and women’s work.

Question 21

What did O’brien and Jones’s study (1996) discover in comparison to Willmott and Young’s study of the nuclear family?

Answer 21

They collected survey data on 600 young people and their parents in a predominately working class area. They found that the area had developed a greater variety of types of family and household. There had been a pluralisation of lifestyles, an increase in marital breakdowns and a rise in dual earner households. Similarly, among working class communities, a continuity in kin relationships persisted.

Question 22

What did Peter Willmott (1988) claim on dispersed extended families?

Answer 22

The dispersed extended family is becoming dominant in Britain. It consists of two or more related families who cooperate with each other even though they live some distance apart.

Question 23

What did Julia Brannen (2003) put forward alternatively to the nuclear family?

Answer 23

Drawing on research in which she was involved, Brannen argues that there are strong intergenerational links in contemporary British families. This is partly because people are living longer and therefore there are more families with three or even four generations alive than there were in the past.

Question 24

What did Leach (1967) say a ‘cereal packet image’ is?

Answer 24

The image of the happily married couple with two children is prominent in advertising and the ‘family sized’ packets of cereals and other types of product are aimed at just this type of grouping.

Question 25

What did Chambers (2001) argue about the development of family diversity?

Answer 25

After the Second World War English-speaking countries developed ideas about ‘sexuality, intimate relationships, living arrangements, reproduction and the socialisation of culture were shaped by key discourses that promoted a static, nuclear version of family. This view was based upon an image of the ‘white modern family’ supported by the view of ‘experts’ and portrayals of families.

Question 26

What did Chambers (2001) argue the concept of the family was based on?

Answer 26

It was based on ‘middle class family values that underpinned concepts of the nation, including national practises of child-rearing and national ideas of suburban community cohesion’. Radio and television were particularly important because they allowed these images to enter into the private and relatively isolated world of the home.

Question 27

What does Weeks et al argue on the 'monolithic family'?

Answer 27

The image of ‘monolithic family’. She argues ‘feminists have challenged the ideology of the ‘monolithic family’ which has elevated the nuclear family with a breadwinner husband and a full time wife and mother as the only legitimate family form’.

Question 28

What does Roseneil argue on the topic of family diversity?

Answer 28

They argue that there is now ‘far greater diversity in people’s domestic arrangements’. There is no longer a clear ‘family circle’ through which most people pass. Most people no longer pass through a routine series of stages in family life.

Question 29

What does Allan and Crow argue the diversity of families is based upon?

Answer 29

This diversity is based upon increased choice. Allan and Crow say ‘individuals and families are now more able to exercise choice and personal volition over domestic and family arrangements’.

Question 30

What does Beck-Gernsheim state within, ‘Reinventing the Family: In Search of New Lifestyles’?

Answer 30

Whilst some groups do ‘retain a traditional image of the family’, but it is becoming increasingly difficult even to maintain a clear definition of what that family is. She says ‘the boundaries are becoming unclear, the definitions are uncertain. There is a growing loss of security’.

Question 31

What does Weeks et al argue on ‘chosen families’?

Answer 31

Homosexuals and lesbians often look upon their households, and even their friendship networks, as being chosen families. Some see their relationships as involving a greater degree of choice than those in more conventional heterosexual families.

Question 32

How does Roseneil (2005) argue on the term heteronorm?

Answer 32

She uses the term heteronorm to refer to the belief that intimate relationships between heterosexual couples and the normal form that intimate relationships take. Roseneil believes that the heteronorm is increasingly breaking down. There is an increasing blurring the boundaries between intimate sexual relationship and friendship.

Question 33

What is the UK’s Civil Partnerships Act of 2004?

Answer 33

Allows civil partnership for gay and lesbian couples.

Question 34

What do Macionis and Plummer (1997) explain reproductive technologies can create?

Answer 34

New reproductive technologies can create previously impossible sets of family relationships. They quote the case of Arlene Schweitzer, who in 1991 gave birth in South Dakota in the USA to her own grandchildren. Plummer asks ‘is Arlette the mother of the twins or the grandmother?’. Such examples force us to consider the adequacy of conventional kinship terms.

Question 35

What does Carol Smart (2007) discuss on the nature of fatherhood?

Answer 35

The nature of fatherhood has changed significantly as a result of new technologies.

Question 36

What does Brown (1995) argue on ‘shotgun weddings’?

Answer 36

In previous eras it was more common for parents to get married, rather than simply cohabit, if they discovered that the woman was pregnant. Now, the partners may choose to cohabit rather than marry.

Question 37

What does the British Social Attitudes Survey (2006) suggest on lone parenthood?

Answer 37

The majority of people still see lone parenthood as less than ideal. Only 44 percent agreed that there was nothing wrong in a single woman choosing to have a child. Furthermore, just 42 percent agreed that ‘one parent can bring up a child as well as two parents’.

Question 38

What did the Rapoports (1982) claim on lone parents?

Answer 38

Lone parent family was increasingly becoming accepted as one aspect of growing family diversity. They believed it was an important ‘emerging form’ of the family which was becoming accepted as a legitimate alternative to other family structures.

Question 39

What does Morgan (1944) argue the reduction of stigma associated with lone parenthood is due to?

Answer 39

The reduction in stigma is reflected in the decreasing use of terms such as ‘illegitimate children’ and ‘unmarried mothers’, which seem to imply some deviation from the norms of family life and their replacement by concepts such as ‘single parent families’ which do not carry such negative connotations.

Question 40

What did Dench et al (2006) identify within the new individualism?

Answer 40

This had been an unintended consequence of developments in the welfare state. In early postwar years, state welfare reform based upon the Beveridge Report. By the 1960s, state welfare placed an emphasis on the citizen rights of individuals. This resulted in the welfare state taking over many of the support roles for individuals which had previously been provided by families. There was a ‘bureaucratisation of caring’.

Question 41

What does Talcott Parsons state what the family has become?

Answer 41

"On the 'macroscopic' levels, almost completely functionless. Its individual members participate in all these functions, but they do so as individuals, not in their roles as family members".

Question 42

What did Chester (1985) on the misleading areas of family diversity?

Answer 42

Changes had only been minor, the basic features of families life had remained largely unchanged for the vast majority. “Most adults still marry and have children. Most children are reared by their natural parents. Most people live in a household headed by a married couple. Most marriages continue until parted by death. No great change seems currently in prospect”.

Question 43

What does Chester (1985) claim the ‘neo-conventional family’ is characterised by?

Answer 43

“The pattern of married women withdrawing from the labour force to become mothers, and some of them taking work as their children mature”. Thus, it is a little different from the conventional family with an increasing number of wives working for at least part of their married lives.

Question 44

What does Jenny Sommerville (2000) argue on the decline of the nuclear family?

Answer 44

The decline of the nuclear family can be exaggerated. She notes that the argument that the traditional family has declined is often based on a comparison of figures from 1971. However this is misleading because the 1960s were an untypical decade in which women ‘had a greater propensity to marry that in previous generations and married at the earliest age ever recorded since civil registration.

Question 45

What does Talcott Parsons conclude on the family becoming more 'specialised'?

Answer 45

"The family is more specialised than before, not in any general sense less important, because society is dependent more exclusively on it for the performance of certain of its vital functions". Thus, the loss of certain functions by the family has made its remaining functions more important.

Question 46

What does Fletcher (1966) suggest about the function of the family within 'The Family and Marriage in Britain'?

Answer 46

Not only has the family retained its functions, but those functions have 'increased in detail and importance'. Even though Fletcher admitted that the family has largely lost its function as a unit of production, it maintains a vital economic function as a unit of consumption. Particularly in the case of modern home-centred families.

Question 47

How do Willmott and Young argue the family provides an economic function?

Answer 47

The Symmetrical stage 3 family provides workers who are motivated to work by their desire for consumer durables. This desire stems from the high value they place on the family and a privatised lifestyle in the family home.

Question 48

Why do Delphy and Leonard (1992) argue the family still continues to perform productive functions?

Answer 48

Industrialisation had created new units of production, but it had not removed the productive function from the family. The productive function is performed to a higher standard now such as 'warm and tidy rooms with attention to decor, and more complex meals with a variety of forms of cooking'.

Question 49

What does Ann Oakley (1974) criticise Willmott and Young for?

Answer 49

Although their figure of 72 per cent sounds impressive, she points out that it is based on only one question on Willmott and Young's interview schedule; "Does your husband help at least once a week with any household jobs, like washing up, making beds, ironing, cooking or cleaning?". Oakley notes that men who make only a very small contribution to housework would be included in the 72 per cent.

Question 50

What do Crompton and Lyonette (2008) argue the two predominant explanations for why women do more housework than men?

Answer 50

1. Economistic and material theories take the view that it may be rational for women to do a greater share for the household if men spend more time in paid employment. 2. The normative and gender construction theory suggests that the division of household labour is not rational at all but is shaped by dominant ideas about gender roles.

Question 51

What did Crompton and Lyonette (2006) find within the shifting of social attitudes?

Answer 51

Data from 1989 and 2006 surveys, Crompton and Lyonette found a shift in attitudes away from a traditional division of labour within the household. Both surveys asked respondents; 'A man's job is to earn money, a woman's job is to look after home and family'. In 1989, 32 percent of men and 26 percent of women agreed with the statement, but by 2006 this had fallen significantly to 17 percent of men and 15 percent of women

Question 52

What does Mary Boulton (1993) argue on childcare?

Answer 52

To her, childcare is 'essentially about exercising responsibility for another person who is not fully responsible for themselves.Although men might help with particular tasks, it is the wives who retain primary responsibility for children. It is the wives who regulate non-domestic aspects of their lives to a low priority.

Question 53

How does the Millenium Cohort Study (2007) support the idea of women providing childcare?

Answer 53

The study found that when a three year old child was ill, 69.6 percent of mothers said they did most of the childcare, and in only 1.1 percent of cases did their partner take main responsibility. However, the survey did find quite high levels of involvement by fathers. Although they were not as involved as mothers, 51 percent of fathers read to their child, and a further 31 percent did so weekly.

Question 54

What did Braun et al (2011) identify within fathers?

Answer 54

Fathers were either classified as 'background fathers', who did not spend as much time with the children and saw the mother as primarily responsible for them, or 'active fathers' who were, 'highly involved fathers'.

Question 55

What does Graham Allan (1985) argue on unpaid work?

Answer 55

The work women carry out in the home may be tedious and less satisfying than the more creative tasks that are frequently done by men. He says, 'much female domestic work is monotonous and mundane, providing few intrinsic satisfactions'.

Question 56

What does Jan Pahl (1989) say the most egalitarian type of control is?

Answer 56

The most egalitarian type of control is wife-controlled pooling. In households with this system the male and female partners tend to have similar amounts of power in terms of decision making, and they are equally likely to experience financial deprivation.

Question 57

What did N.James (1989) identify within 'emotional work'?

Answer 57

"From a very early age girls and then women become subconsciously trained to be more emotionally stable in recognising and empathising with the moods of others".

Question 58

What did Dunscombe and Marsden (1995) suggest on 'emotional work'?

Answer 58

Some forms of domestic work cannot be measured in conventional surveys, such as emotional work. Many women hold the relationship together through doing the crucial emotional work.

Question 59

What did Gillian Dunne (1999) suggest on cohabitating lesbian couples?

Answer 59

"A high level of flexibility and even handedness characterised the allocation of employment responsibilities in partnerships". Boundaries between masculinity and femininity and the hierarchical nature of gender relationships, help to produce conventional domestic divisions of labour in heterosexual households.

Question 60

What does Brenda Almond (2006) believe the family is?

Answer 60

The family is fragmenting. She argues that there has been a shift away from concern with the family, as a biological institution based upon the rearing of children, towards the family as an institution which emphasises ‘two people’s emotional need or desire for one another’.

Question 61

What does Morgan (2003) suggest on the total fertility rates?

Answer 61

Total fertility rates have fallen. In the 1870’s, around five children were born per woman, but this declined to below two in the 1930’s to around two. Morgan sees the decline in fertility as a part of the general decline in family life. She links it to the rise in cohabitation, noting women who are cohabitating rather than married are more likely to have only one child.

Question 62

What did Wasoff, Jamieson and Smith (2005) suggest on single-parent households?

Answer 62

Analysed data from the British Household Panel Survey between 1991 and 2002 to discover how the situation of people living alone changed over time. They found that only 7% remained living alone throughout the whole period.

Question 63

What do Jamieson et al (2009) conclude on single parent households?

Answer 63

They do not conclude that solo living is a long term choice for most people. Not only do most people come to solo living through the ending of a relationship, but only a minority continue to live alone for a long time.

Question 64

What does Fletcher (1996) argue on the value of marriage?

Answer 64

Argues ‘a relatively high divorce rate may be indicative not of lower but of higher standards of marriage in society’. People expect and demand more from marriage and consequently are more likely to end a relationship which may have been acceptable in the past.

Question 65

What does Willian J Goode (1971) argue on the value of marriage?

Answer 65

The family carries a heavier emotional burden when it exists independently than when it is a small unit within a larger kin fabric. As a consequence this unit is relatively fragile.

Question 66

What does Leach (1967) argue on the emotional overload within the family?

Answer 66

The nuclear family suffers from an emotional overload, which increases the level of conflict between its members. In industrialised society the family specialises in fewer functions. It can be argued that as a result, there are fewer bonds to unite its members. The economic bond is considerably weakened when the family ceases to be a unit of production.

Question 67

What do Graham Allan and Graham Crow (2001) suggest on marriage?

Answer 67

‘Marriage is less embedded within the economic system’ than it used to be. There are fewer family-owned businesses and, most importantly husband and wives now usually have independent sources of income from paid employment.

Question 68

What do Cooke and Gash (2010) argue on employment and divorce?

Answer 68

Using data from the British Household Panel Survey found no connection between women working part-time or full-time and the likelihood of them getting divorced. Furthermore, there was no significant relationship between the level of earnings of wives and husbands and divorce rates. This suggests that greater independence for some women as a result of their earnings was not a significant factor affecting divorce.

Question 69

What does Gibson (1994) argue on the development of modernity and conflict?

Answer 69

The development of modernity has increased the likelihood between spouses because it encourages individualism and choice. A higher divorce rate may be indicative of modern couples generally anticipating a superior standard of personal marital satisfaction then was expected by previous generations. ‘Greater freedom to judge, choose and change their mind has encouraged women to become more assertive about what they expect from marriage’, they increasingly exercise freedom by leaving marriages.

Question 70

What does Gibson (1994) argue on secularisation?

Answer 70

Secularisation has weakened the degree of which religious beliefs can bind a couple together and make divorce less likely.

Question 71

What was The Divorce Reform Act?

Answer 71

Came into force in 1971, no longer emphasised the idea of matrimonial offences and so avoided the need for ‘guilty parties’ It defined the grounds for divorce as ‘irretrievable breakdown’ of the marriage. This made divorce considerably easier and accounts for the dramatic rise in the number of divorces.

Question 72

What did The Family Law Act of 1996 introduce?

Answer 72

It introduced a number of new measures. No longer did it have to be demonstrated that one or both partners were at fault in order to prove that a marriage had broken down. Instead, the partners simply had to assert that the marriage had broken down and undergone a ‘period of reflection’ to consider whether a reconciliation was possible.

Question 73

What does Carol Smart (2011) suggest on the increase of divorce?

Answer 73

Smart attributes the rise in divorce to a combination of changes in divorce legislation, greater economic independence for women, and reduced stigma associated with relationships breaking down. From her point of view, divorce has increased instability and fluidity in families but it has not destroyed them or prevented bonds between different generations remaining strong.

Question 74

What do Allan and Crow (1985) argue on state provision?

Answer 74

“Much of state provision is based upon an implicit ideology of the ‘normal’ family which through its incorporation info standard practice discourages alternative forms of domestic organisation from developing.”

Question 75

What does Roy Parker (1982) argue on state assistance?

Answer 75

Claims that state assistance tends not to be given to the elderly and sick if they live with relatives. It is assumed that the family will care for them. In both the care of the elderly and infirm the care of the children, this generally means wives will be expected to take up these domestic responsibilities.

Question 76

What does Lorraine Fox Harding (1996) argue on single parents and the state?

Answer 76

In practice married couples with children tend to be favoured over single parents with children. Single parents are usually provided with the least desirable housing. “Most dwellings are constructed for and provided for the nuclear family and are planned and designed by men. The centrality of family reinforces dominant notions of the family and non family housing.”

Question 77

What does Lorraine Fox Harding (1996) argue on maternity pay?

Answer 77

Regulations relating to maternity leave and pay reinforce traditional gender roles. In Britain, fathers have very limited rights to take leave from work on the birth of a child, compared to women. However, when Fox Harding was writing, paternity rights have increased, although they are still not as generous as maternity rights.

Question 78

What does The Child Support Agency 1993 establish?

Answer 78

It oversees the payment of maintenance by ‘absent’ parents to the parents responsible for looking after the children. It’s work therefore covers divorced, separated and never-married couples who live apart. In this respect it can be seen as supporting the traditional nuclear family by imposing financial costs and moral values to those who no not live in one.

Question 79

What does Brenda Almond (2006) argue on divorce?

Answer 79

The liberalisation of divorce laws undermines the idea of marriage as a lifelong commitment, and that the reconciliation of civil partnerships for gay and lesbian couples sends signals to people that conventional families are no longer seen as preferable to other living arrangements.

Question 80

What do Abbott and Wallace (1992) argue the New Right attack?

Answer 80

The New Right attacked welfare systems for encouraging deviant lifestyles and family forms. For example, welfare payments allowed mothers to bring up their children in single parent families, taxation policies discriminated against married couples, divorce laws made it easier to end marriage and abortion laws and relaxation laws against homosexuality undermined traditional morality.

Question 81

What does Margaret Thatcher state in 1988?

Answer 81

“The family is the building block of society. It’s a nursery school, a hospital, a leisure place, a place of refuge and a place of rest. It encompasses the whole of society. It fashions beliefs. It’s the preparation for the rest of our life and women run it.”

Question 82

What does Jennifer Somerville (200) argue on Tony Blair’s government?

Answer 82

Tony Blair’s government idealised the family as a “working example of mutual interdependence, care and responsibility”. It also increased “the expectations of parental responsibility with regard to financial support for children”.

Question 83

What does Jill Kirby (2009) argue on traditional Conservative beliefs?

Answer 83

Traditional Conservative beliefs in the inadequacy of alternatives to conventional families are still apparent in some statements. For example, David Cameron in 2007, explicitly links violence to ‘broken’ families with absent fathers. More generally, he tied these issues to the idea of a ‘broken society’.

Question 84

What does Giddens (1992) argue on ‘romantic love’?

Answer 84

Romantic love involves idealising the object of one’s love and, for women in particular, telling stories to oneself about how one’s life could become fulfilled through the relationship. Yet, for Giddens, “for women dreams of romantic love have all too often led to grim domestic segregation”. Thus in practice, it has tended to lead to the dominance of men.

Question 85

What does Giddens (1992) argue on ‘plastic sex’?

Answer 85

Plastic sexuality involves sex being freed from its association with childbirth altogether. People have much greater choice over when, how often and with whom they engage in sex. With plastic sexuality, sex is a type of leisure pursuit. The development of plastic sexuality is connected to the development of improved methods of contraception.

Question 86

What does Giddens (1992) argue on ‘institutional reflexivity’?

Answer 86

Reflexivity describes the way in which people reflect upon the institutions that are apart of the social world and try to change them for the better. This extended into the creation of self identity, people can increasingly choose who they want to be. They are no longer stuck with the roles into which they are born and to which they are confined by the dictates of tradition.

Question 87

In what way are Beck and Beck-Gernsheim (1995) different to Giddens (1992 postmodern approach?

Answer 87

They follow Giddens in arguing that modernity is characterised by increasing individual choice, in contrast to an emphasis upon following tradition in pre-modern societies. However, they characterise this process as involving individualisation rather than reflexivity, and see it as having rather different consequences from these outlined by Giddens.

Question 88

What do Beck and Beck-Gernsheim (1995) argue on individualisation?

Answer 88

Individualisation involves an extension to the areas of life in which individuals are expected to make their own decisions.

Question 89

To Beck and Beck-Gernsheim (1995) what does the nuclear family offer?

Answer 89

The nuclear family seems to ‘offer a sort of refuge in the chilly environment of our affluent, impersonal, uncertain society, stripped of its traditions and scarred by all kinds of risk. Love will become more important than ever and equally impossible’. Love is important as people believe they can express and fulfil their individuality through a loving relationship.

Question 90

Why do Beck and Beck-Gernsheim (1995) argue individualisation is flawed?

Answer 90

These contradictions lead to ‘the normal chaos of love’. Love is increasingly craved to provide security in an insecure world, but it is increasingly difficult to find and sustain.

Question 91

What does Morgan (1996) argue on family diversity?

Answer 91

This approach draws upon a wide variety of influences, including feminism, postmodernism and interactionism. It tries to avoid the sort of modern approach to studying ‘the family’ which assumes families have a fixed structure and clear boundaries between themselves and the outside world.

Question 92

What does Morgan (1996) argue on the outdated nature when studying families?

Answer 92

Modern approaches to studying family living have become outdated because of changes in families and societies. Both and increasingly characterised by ‘flux’, fluidity and change. The family is not a static entity that can be frozen at a moment in time so that it’s form can be clearly analysed. Rather it is constituted by ongoing processes of change.

Question 93

What do Smart and Neale (1999) argue on divorce laws?

Answer 93

Divorce law in the 1960s and 1970s embraced the idea that individuals should have the opportunity to re-establish a sense of self after divorce by accepting the idea of a ‘clean break’, freed from any need to continue to associate with their former spouse. Each divorcee could go about constructing a new sense of identity and perhaps seeking a ‘pure’ relationship?

Question 94

What does Vanessa May (2011) argue on personal relationships?

Answer 94

Personal relationships are not confined to families and should not be exclusively studied in terms of the sociology of the family. May goes on to argue that personal life includes not only family life at home but also going to school or to work, taking part in financial transactions in shops and engaging in public policy.