Families- T2- Theories of the Family

Question 1

FUNCTIONALISM= What did Murdock say were the main functions of the family?

Answer 1

1. Reproduction
2. Sexual
3. Education (socialisation)
4. Economic

Question 2

What are the 7 functions that functionalists believe the family have:

Answer 2

1. Primary Socialisation (Parsons)
2. Family Socialisation
3. Parsons Warm Bath Theory
4. Gender Role Socialisation
   5.Protective and Welfare
5. Social Control
6. Economic Consumption

Question 3

What is Primary Socialisation? PARSONS

Answer 3

• he believed that the newly evolved nuclear family specialised in socialising children
• sees family as acting as a bridge between children and wider society
• he said that a child can only become a sociable adult by internalising the norms and values of society
  therefore saw nuclear family as ‘personality factories’

Question 4

What is Family Socialisation?

Answer 4

PARSONS:
Primary
Expressive vs Instrumental
- It maintains order in society
This is very powerful- people identities are based on society’s values
- families are factories producing human personalities and is able to do this with the love and security it provides

Question 5

What is Parsons Warm Bath Theory?

Answer 5

This claims that family life stabilises adult personalities
- The socialisation and supervision of children gives parents a sense of stability and responsibility
parsons views the family as a positive and beneficial place for all its members
Steel And Kidd not the family does this by providing a loving and stable environment in the home

Question 6

What is Gender Role Socialisation?

Answer 6

Children learn the cultural patterns of behaviour expected of their gender from an early age; people are trained by their parents child rearing practises to conform to social expectations
- in this sense gender differences are not biological or natural but are socially constructed by society
- Chapman argues that through play children learn their gender identity- social construct

Question 7

Main summary of the Functionalist View of Families

Answer 7

• Functionalists believe that the family is beneficial for all its members and society as a whole
• The family has a number of basic functions that contribute to the smooth running of society
• Families functions will change to meet the needs of the society in which it is found (functional fit theory)

Question 8

Evaluation of Functionalist view?

Answer 8

• Murdock/ Parsosn see the family through ‘rose-tinted’ glasses
• Functionalists ignore issues such as domestic violence, neglect and child abuse (the dark side of the family)
• Feminists argue that the family is not beneficial for all the members but only men, patriarchal
• Marxists argue that the family benefits capitalism NOT society as a whole

Question 9

What are the functions that Marxists believe the nuclear family perform for capitalism?

Answer 9

1. Inheritance of Property
2. Ideological Functions
3. Consumption

Question 10

What are Monogamous Nuclear families and how does it help capitalism

Answer 10

Marx and Engels- believed they were developed as a way to pass on private property to heirs- Proof of paternity
They also argue that a women’s role in the family was similar to a prostitute

Question 11

How is the Nuclear Family an ISA?

Answer 11

Zaretsky 1976
- ideological function
- ‘Haven’
- Males have control
This release helps them deal with their daily oppression- status quo of society

Question 12

What does Marxism think of socialisation in nuclear families?

Answer 12

When children socialsied theyre taught to accept their position in society and that it is vital to work
Theyre taught the hierarchy of the system
The modern NF functions to promote values to create reproduction and maintenance of capitalism
Family described as Ideological apparatus- meaning it socialises people to think in a way to justify inequality and to accept the capitalist system
This can be shown through the hierarchy in most families, e.g. children will accept there will always be someone in ‘authority’

Question 13

How does the nuclear family contribute to consumption?

Answer 13

Plays a major role in generating profits- consumer
- advertisers encourage latest consumption
- adverts target children ‘pester power’
-those who dont have are mocked
Thus the family is also a source of profit for capitalism

Question 14

How can the Marxist view be criticised?

Answer 14

• What about men who marry for love?- not always down to property
• Many women work- genderquake
• Ignore the ‘Functions’- support and emotional security- too focused on wealth
• Too deterministic- assumes people passively accept family life
• Focuses on the Nuclear Family- ignore a wide variety of families and benefits
• Feminism- argue they place too must importance on class

Question 15

What do Marxist Feminists views of the family?

Answer 15

They use Marxist Ideology
- base ideas upon class confluct an the role that women have in society not male dominated societies
Women reproduce the workforce… for free
Women have a ‘triple-work’ shift- the symmetrical family is a myth
Its a womens jobs to comfort the hard working man!
Women are a reserve army of labour
Ansley- ‘Women are takers of sh*t’

Question 16

What do Radical Feminists think?

Answer 16

Greer- Society is patriarchal
The family- chance for men to exert their dominance and power over women- this may be reinforced by domestic violence
Heterosexual relationships are ‘sleeping with the enemy’ and the only way to stop the patriarchal society is to live independently

Question 17

What do Liberal Feminists think?

Answer 17

• They think that womens oppression is gradually being overcome through campaigning- Sex discrimination act
• ‘March of Progress’- progress towards equality, domestic labour studies (Young and Willmott)
• Gender Socialisation reinforces gender inequality- needs to change for true equality

Question 18

What do Difference Feminists think?

Answer 18

They argue that we cannot generalise all women’s experiences
Fails to recognise the similarities that women face

Question 19

What are criticisms of the feminist theories?

Answer 19

Women’s roles are not always the same in all families
Women do have choices- some enjoy being housewives or having a career
70% of divorces are initiated by women- showing they can leave ‘oppressive’ relationships and do hold some power in the family
Somerville (on Key thinkers doc)

Question 20

What do Personal life sociologists critique about other theories?

Answer 20

They think Functionalism, Marxism and Feminism all have 2 weaknesses:
1. they assume that the traditional nuclear family is dominant- family diversity
2. They are all structural theories (meta-narratives)

Question 21

What is the sociology of the personal life theory

Answer 21

• Strong ties with interactionist ideas (Mead)
• Bottom up
• Individual- meaning to relationships
  -Relationships can take many forms
• DNA does not determine a family
• Social relationships are more important than genetic ones

Question 22

What are relationships that are seen as giving a sense of identity?

Answer 22

Relationships with friends
Fictive Kin
Gay and Lesbian Chosen families
Relationships with dead relatives
Relationships with pets

Question 23

What do personal life sociologists think about donor conceived children?

Answer 23

Nordvqvist and Smart- issues of blood and genes raised a range of feelings for families
some parents emphasised the importance of social realtionships over genetic ones
Who counts as family for a donor conceived child?
Equality between the genetic and non-genetic mother?

Question 24

What are Carol Smart Core Concepts?

Answer 24

1. Memory
2. Biography
3. Embeddedness
4. Relationality
5. Imaginary

Question 25

What is meant by Memory?

Answer 25

It is a selective process
The more meaningful an event, the more likely it is to be remembered, and meaningfulness normally involves personal relationships
Emotions like passion, love, feelings of rejection, fear, jealousy and sense of security can be closely related to the history of your own family
Families often provides context which influences what we remember, and shared memory is an important part of connections between family members

Question 26

What is meant by Biography?

Answer 26

The sort of an individual’s life, is also important in understanding personal life
it can provide in-depth descriptions for the researcher and help in understanding movement through the life course
useful to study biography of different family members to appreciate how experience same events in different ways

Question 27

What is meant by Embeddedness?

Answer 27

Important to smart partly because helps to counterbalance excess emphasis on individuals in theories like those of Giddens and Beck-Gernsheim
Shows how the experiences of individuals are made meaningful through being embedded in webs of relationships with other people, whether family, kin or friends

Question 28

What is meant by Relationality?

Answer 28

Concerned with how people relate to one another and it plays down the significance of formal structures within the outside families
The idea of relationality is more important than the position of a person with a family structure and that emotionally significant relationships are not confined to kin

Question 29

What is meant by Imaginary?

Answer 29

It is concerned with how people’s relationships and memories exist as much in the imagination as in reality

Question 30

Evaluation of Personal Life perspective

Answer 30

PROS
- Nordqvist and Smart study illustrates the value of the PL perspective
- It helps us understand how people construct their family, rather than impose traditional values on them
- recognises intimate relationships as an important function- sense of belonging
- Believe a more in depth understanding of families that can be gained

CONS
- To broad- by including a wide range of perspectives we ignore the special ties of blood and marriage
- It lacks a clear focus
- The narrow focus of the research can lose sight of wider patterns of social change

Question 31

What does modernity think of the family?

Answer 31

• believe in social change and the direction is for the better and more efficient and effective social institutions
• It can be through evolutionary change or planning
• Evolutionary change seen in people’s view through industrialisation and Young and Willmotts march of progress theory
• Giddens believes that modernity itself has change and entered late modernity which doesn’t involve a complete break but highlights significant change and effects on the family life
• Giddens sees these changes in a broadly positive light although not being necessarily beneficial and progressive

Question 32

What is Giddens theory of Transformation of intimacy?

Answer 32

He argues that due to late-modernity, social changes have taken place in intimate relationships between people
1. Modern Love
2. Plastic Sexuality

Question 33

What is Modern Love?

Answer 33

According to him in the modern era, marriage and family lids were based on the idea of romantic love- from aristocracy
It should be egalitarian because the bond is based on mutual attraction
However in practice it has tended to lead to the dominance of men over women
A sexual realtion stems from romantic attraction
partners are bound together until death
The idea of romantic love is therefore the foundation of family life- this seen as ideal in society

Question 34

What is Plastic Sexuality?

Answer 34

Believes that in the later decades of the modern era- late modernity- people started to lose the belief that there was single and right way to live our life
Giddens argue this involved the development of reflexivity- the ability to reflects upon your life and make choice as to the best way forward
In other words, people began to question sex life, child rearing and marriage should be entangled and whether you should stay with the same partner for life
Ideas of plastic sexuality which involved sex being freed from association with children and have been begun to develop
People have greater choice over how, when and whom they engage in sex with
Sex has become a type of leisure pursuit

Question 35

How has Giddens theory changed conflict love and the pure relationship

Answer 35

Emergence of plastic sexuality changes the nature of love
Romantic love is increasingly replaced with confluent love- which only lasts as long as it benefits the lover
Changes in divorces have made this easier people now have the power to choose, they are not completed to stay together
People now base idea of a relationship on a pure relationships rather than marriage and romantic passion
Giddens sees pure relationships as having the potential to create more equality between men and women
They have an openness and a mutual concern and respect

Question 36

How has Modernity changed self-identity?

Answer 36

Giddens sees reflexivity as the key characteristic of modernity
Modernity involves the increasing application of reason, which is used to work how institutions can run better
Reflexivity cn be used for this
it reaches into all areas of life and increasingly into the more personal- self help books to improve sex life
This extends into the creation of a self identity
People can choose who they want to be- reflexive self- continually reviewing self and progress towards ideals
People try out new relationships to discover who they are
this may be part of creating a self-identity