The Personal Life perspective on families

Question 1

What is the sociology of personal life?

Answer 1

• A new perspective that is strongly influenced by interactionist ideas, it argues that to understand families, we must start from the POV of the individuals concerned and the meanings they give to their relationships

Question 2

How is this perspective different to ones such as Marxism, Feminism and Functionalism?

Answer 2

• Functionalism, Feminism and Marxism all take a ‘top down’ structural approach
• Whereas the personal life perspective uses a ‘bottom up’ approach, which emphasises the meanings that individual family members hold and how these shape their actions and relationships

Question 3

What are some categories of people that aren’t conventionally defined as ‘family’?

Answer 3

1. Relationships with friends
2. Fictive kin- close friends who are treated as relatives
3. Gay and lesbian ‘chosen families’
4. Relationships with dead relatives
5. Relationships with pets: Tipper (2011)- children frequently saw their pets as ‘part of the family’

Question 4

What did Nordqvist and Smart find in their research about donor-conceived children?

Answer 4

• Some parents emphasised the importance of social relationships over genetic ones in forming family bonds
• One mother defined a mother in terms of the time and effort she puts into raising her daughter
• Tense feelings can arise for a non-genetic parent if somebody remarked that the child looked like them
• Difficult for lesbian couples due to ownership issues

Question 5

What is the evaluation of the personal life perspective?

Answer 5

1. It can be accused of taking too broad a view, and we ignore what is special about blood relationships