Feminist ,New Right approaches (+impact of industrialisation) Flashcards
What liberal feminist differentiated between sex and gender?
What term is given to the process in which men and women are shaped into their roles?
What is the difference between gender and sex?
How does this allow for a reformation of the patriarchal family?
Subsequently what view do liberal feminsts take on the family?
What law reforms to the family support this outlook?
While families serve patriarchy what do liberal feminists argue the family can also be?
-Ann Oakley.
-Canalisation
-Sex is biological and gender is socially constructed.
-If the family is constructed on gender norms then a reconstruction of gender will result in a reconstruction of the family.
-Liberal feminists have a march of progress outlook on the family.
-The Marital Rape Act 1991, reforms to divorce laws and abortion laws.
-Liberal feminists argue the family can be equal and unoppressive.
Do Radical feminists agree that changes to the law or attitudes will be enough to end women’s oppression?
What radical feminist provided the alternative of matriarchal households?
What approach focuses on the idea that women are forced into ‘compulsory heterosexuality’?
Who argued that women’s capacity to bear and raise children makes them dependent on men?
-NO. Only revolution will end patriarchy.
-Greer. Proposed the idea of matriarchal households.
- ‘Political lesbianism’ focuses on the idea of compulsory heterosexuality.
-Firestone explained that women’s capacity to bear and raise infants leads to dependency.
What do marxist feminsts argue? What are the three ways capitalism benefits from women?
Who argued that women are ‘taker’s of the shit’?
-Marxist feminsts argue that women are exploited both by patriarchy and by capitalism and the family best serves the interests of men and bosses.
-Women reproduce the labour force(socialising next gen).
-Women absorb anger(Ansley taker’s of the shit).
-Women are the reserve army of cheap labour(WWII).
Why are feminists criticised for their approach to the family? Why do postmodern feminists critcise radicals?
Why do difference feminists criticise mainstream?
-Like Marxists, some suggest feminists paint too gloomy a picture. Some families are much more equal and not all women and girls are oppressed by their husbands and fathers.
-Radical feminists are criticised for seeing women as passive victims of patriarchy. Postmodern feminists argue that women can make choices and assert their power.
-Difference feminists argue that mainstream feminism takes an ethnocentric approach focusing on white middle class women.
-Some feminist theories are seen as outdated, describing society of traditional nuclear families with working husbands and stay-at-home wives. Contemporary families are more diverse.
What family type is favoured by the New Right?
What do they argue is the current state of the family institution?
Who focuses on the welfare state providing perverse incentives? What does he mean?
-The traditional nuclear family. (Married, heterosexual with small number of children).
-They argue that in contemporary society(due to gov’t policies) the nuclear family has been undermined.
-Charles Murray.
-He argued that the welfare state provides perverse incentives for people to form lone-parent families e.g. receiving benefits and leading to children growing up in workless households and forming an underclass in society.
Why is the New Right approach to the family criticised? What is it seen as an ideological justification for? By who?
-Many sociologists strongly disagree with New Right views which they see as ‘blaming the victims’ of poverty for their own poverty.
-Some would argue that the New Right is not really a sociological perspective at all, instead a political perspective. Marxists argue it is just an ideological justification for pro-capitalist policies(e.g. cutting public spending and reducing taxes on the wealthy.)
Who focused on the impact of industrialisation on the family?
What did he argue pre-industrial families were?
What did the industrial revolution require of people?
What did nuclear families become as a result?
Was urban nuclear families more meritocratic? How?
How were gender roles formed?
What name did Parsons give to the position the nuclear family played in society?
-Talcott Parsons.
-Pre-industrial families tended to be large, extended families, where the family acted as a unit of production.
-The industrial revolution required people to move to urban areas.
-Nuclear families were therefore more geographically mobile and socially mobile(less expectation for son to follow job of father.)
-YES. People had an achieved status rather than an ascribed status.
-Men worked in industry taking a instrumental leadership role women worked domestically as expressive leaders.
-Parsons said the family had a ‘functional fit’.
Instead of Parsons extended families what did Peter Laslett find pre-industrial families were often made up of?
According to Anderson what type of families dominated the early industrial era unlike Parsons Nuclear family?
Subsequently what is Parsons criticised for being?
-Nuclear families.
-Anderson found that early industrial families were more likely to be extended, as people moved in with relatives when they migrated to towns.
-Parsons is criticised for being an ‘armchair theorist’. Families were more diverse than he acknowledged and his ideas about being an ideal ‘functional’ family and there being appropriate gender roles are seen as outdated.
What approach did Young and Wilmott take when reviewing the family?
What did they argue about the relationship between the family and industrialisation? Describe these
-Young and Wilmott take a March of progress approach.
-They argued the family would engage in a four step process?
-Step 1: The pre-industrial family (unit of production)
-Step 2: The early industrial family(geo-mobility with gender roles)
-Step 3: Symmetrical family -Share of workload
-Step 4: Asymmetrical family- Back to gender roles.
Why is the March of progress view criticised? Diversity?
What did Oakley argue?
-Feminists such as Ann Oakley argued the family has never been symmetrical. Men hardly contribute and do so electively.
-It suggests all families change over time, whereas in fact there was some family diversity before and after industrialisation, just as rural economies and ways of life continued to exist during and after industrialisation.
-Outdated. There have been significant economic and social changes since they were written that have had profound effects on family life. (1973)
