Postmodernist view on family diversity

Question 1

What are the advantages of greater diversity and choice that postmodernists emphasise?

Answer 1

• gives individuals greater freedom to plot their own life course, choose the kind of family and personal relationships that meet their needs

Question 2

However, what is the major disadvantage that some postmodernists choose to highlight?

Answer 2

• that greater freedom of choice and relationships means a greater risk of instability

Question 3

What are some of the features the new postmodern phase that society has entered has?

Answer 3

• increasingly individualistic
• less controlled by tradition
• fragmented
• diverse
• characterised by rapid social change and less predictability

Question 4

How does Morgan define a family?

Answer 4

• as whatever arrangements those involved choose to call their family

Question 5

While Morgan recognises that family practices are a way of an individual creating their sense of being a ‘family member’ - what does he comment?

Answer 5

• that in actuality the life course and family practices take place in a wider social structure and context of norms which influence our beliefs about our rights, responsibilities and obligations within the family

Question 6

Give an example of how Morgan identifies that wider social norms exert an influence over family members’ expectations and actions

Answer 6

• gender norms and differences in job opportunities and social policy which may dictate that men and women take on different gender roles

Question 7

What method is used by sociologists to focus their attention on how people create their own diverse family lives and practices?

Answer 7

• life course analysis

Question 8

As well as people being able to choose the decisions they make, what else does flexibility and variation in people’s lives relate to?

Answer 8

• the timing and sequence of events that they choose

Question 9

Due to relationships being a lot more based on the benefits for both partners and people having the freedom to leave, what do they become?

Answer 9

• they become part of the process of the individual’s self discovery or self-identity, trying different relationships becomes a way of establishing ‘who we are’

Question 10

What does Giddens argue that the pure relationship is modelled on?

Answer 10

• same-sex relationships which have historically been less bound by tradition and more democratic

Question 11

Giddens recognises that more choice in personal relationships means they inevitably become less stable and contribute to greater family diversity.
How does this contribute to his view that they are modelled on same-sex relationships?

Answer 11

• same-sex families have traditionally been actively created in diverse ways to serve individual needs

Question 12

Is there a link between a risk society and a pure relationship?

Answer 12

• yes, a pure relationship exists to please both partners and is more equal but also more unstable because either partner will feel able to leave if it not longer pleases and fulfils them. This creates a more unpredictable society as couples are not controlled by norms

Question 13

What type of biography is linked to the negotiated family and why?

Answer 13

• the ‘do it yourself’ biography because if people feel more able to break from norms and make their own decisions to sculpt their life course they will enter a negotiated family which satisfies their needs, wishes and expectations and is not controlled by norms and traditions

Question 14

Beck and Giddens have been influenced by postmodernist ideas. What is their thesis called?

Answer 14

• the Individualisation Thesis

Question 15

What does the Individualisation Thesis argue?

Answer 15

• in the past, people’s lives were defined, shaped and dictated by fixed roles that prevented people choosing their own life course

Question 16

How has the ‘do it yourself’ biography come about?

Answer 16

• as a result of the fewer certainties, norms and roles that was are expected to fulfil

Question 17

Though the traditional picture of family life may have been unequal, what was it?

Answer 17

• clear, stable and predictable

Question 18

Rather negatively, Beck calls the family a ‘zombie category’ - what does he mean by this?

Answer 18

• that ultimately it appears to be alive and people desire it to be a haven of security but it is subject to the same insecurity and instability as other aspects of modern society