George Murdock

Question 1

George Peter Murdock

Answer 1

argues that the family performs 4 essential functions to meet the needs of society and its members

Question 2

What are the four essential needs to meet the needs of society and its members:

Answer 2

• stable satisfaction of the sex drive with the same partner, preventing the social disruption caused by sexual ‘free for all’
• reproduction of the next generation, without which society could not continue
• socialisation of the young into society’s shared norms and values
• meetings its members economic needs e.g. food and shelter

Question 3

How do marxists and feminists criticise Murdock?

Answer 3

• marxists and feminists reject his ‘rose tinted’ harmonious consensus view that the family meets the needs of both wider society and all the different members of the family
• they argue that functionalism neglects conflicts and exploitation:
• feminists see the family as serving the needs of men and oppressing women
• marxists argue that it meets the needs of capitalism, not those of the family members or society as a whole

Question 4

How have others criticised Murdock’s approach?

Answer 4

-while few sociologists would doubt that most of these are important functions, some argue that they could be performed equally well by other institutions or by non-nuclear family structures