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Families and Households > Theories of the family > Flashcards

Theories of the family Flashcards

1
Q

What do functionalists believe about the family?

A

They believe that the family is just like an organ in the body. They believe that family enables society to function to maintain social order and social cohesion.

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2
Q

Who are the two functionalists in sociology?

A

Murdock (1949) and Parsons (1955).

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3
Q

What does Murdock believe that family performs?

A

He believes the family performs essential functions to meet the needs of society and its members.

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4
Q

What are the four essential functions?

A
  1. Stable satisfaction of sex drive
  2. Reproduction of next generation
  3. Socialisation of the young
  4. Meeting its members’ economic needs so the state doesn’t have to pay.
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5
Q

What are 2 criticisms of Murdock?

A
  1. Other institutions and family types can perform these functions.
  2. He has a rose-tinted, harmonious, consensus view.
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6
Q

What is a feminist criticism of Murdock?

A

Feminists believe that family serves the needs of men and oppresses women.

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7
Q

What is a Marxist criticism of Murdock?

A

Marxists believe that family meets the needs of capitalism, not the family members as a whole.

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8
Q

What does Parsons (1955) believe about the family?

A

He believes that the functions the family performs would depend on the needs of society.

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9
Q

What does Parsons argue that the family in modern society has become?

A

A unit of consumption.

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10
Q

What does Parsons believe the nuclear family needs?

A

Primary socialisation of children and stabilisation of adult personalities.

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11
Q

What are the two kinds of family structures according to Parsons

A
  1. Nuclear family
  2. Extended family
    - Fit the needs of the society in which it’s found
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12
Q

According to Parsons what are the two basic types of society?

A
  1. Modern industrial society
  2. Traditional pre-industrial society
    - Nuclear family meet the needs of modern industrial society and extended family meets the needs of a traditional pre industrial society.
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13
Q

According to Parsons what were the two types of workforces used in the traditional pre industrial society and modern industrial society?

A
  1. Geographical mobile workforce
    - Nuclear family better fitted to the need that modern industry has for a GMW.
  2. A socially mobile workforce
    - Nuclear family better equipped to meet the needs of industrial society.
    - Mobile nuclear family structurally isolated from kin, may keep in touch compared to before where they had a duty.
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14
Q

What do Marxists think about the family?

A

They see the family as a weapon to control the poor.

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15
Q

What do the capital class, the bourgeoisie, own?

A

They own the means of production.

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16
Q

What do the working class, the proletariat, do?

A

Their labour is exploited by the capitalist for profit.

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17
Q

What do Marxists believe the functions of the family are performed for?

A

The benefit of the capitalist system.

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18
Q

What does Engels believe about the family?

A

He believes the family developed so that men could control children and women and allow them to pass property for biological offspring.

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19
Q

What does Engels believe the family is used for?

A

Inheritance of property.

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20
Q

What does Engels believe women turned into?

A

An instrument for the production of children.

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21
Q

What does Zaretsky say about the family?

A

That they are a unit of consumption and a prop to the capitalist system.

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22
Q

What does Zaretsky say about housewives?

A

That their unpaid work supports future generations of workers.

23
Q

What is Zaretsky’s view on the family being a unit of consumption?

A

The family consumes products by the bourgeoisie to make profit as the family supports workers to help them carry on working.

24
Q

What does Zaretsky believe the family is important for?

A

An important market for the sale of consumer goods.

25
Q

What is an example of this?

A

Children who lack the latest clothes, or must have gadgets, are mocked and stigmatised by their peers.

26
Q

What is a criticism of Zaretsky’s view?

A

The nuclear family is dominant and ignores other family structures.

27
Q

What is a feminist criticism of Zaretsky’s view?

A

Feminists believe that the Marxist emphasis on capitalism and social class underestimates the importance of gender inequalities.

28
Q

What is a functionalist criticism of Zaretsky’s view?

A

Functionalists believe that he ignores the benefits that the family provides such as intimacy and support.

29
Q

What is the overall feminist view on the family?

A

Family is a tool of female oppression and in particular the nuclear family serves the needs of men rather than women.
- Through unequal division of domestic labour and domestic violence.
- Gender inequality is a social construction and not a natural phenomena.

30
Q

What does the triple shift refer to?

A

The three roles that women are expected to perform for the family:
1. Emotional Support
2. Domestic Labour
3. Paid work

31
Q

What does the dual burden refer to?

A

Refers to the two traditional roles that women are expected to play in the family:
1. Emotional Support
2. Domestic Labour

32
Q

What does malesteam sociology refer to?

A

Refers to the way that sociologists will apply research data collected about men to the lives of women despite their different experiences.

33
Q

What’s the liberal feminist view of the family?

A

Families are slowly becoming more equal through changes in law and social attitudes. E.g. Sex Discrimination Act (1975)
- Not fully but gradually
- E.g. parents are now socialising their children in more gender neutral ways > similar aspirations for both sons and daughters and chores not being determined by gender.

34
Q

What are criticisms to the liberal feminist view of the family?

A
  1. Women still have the triple shift.
  2. Marxist and Radical feminists - fail to challenge the underlying causes of women’s oppression and changing the law is not enough to bring about equality, there needs to be a fundamental change in social structures.
35
Q

What’s the radical feminist view of the family?

A
  1. Believe men are the enemy and marriage and family are the key institutions which allow patriarchy to exist.
    - In order for equality to be achieved patriarchy needs to be overturned.
    - Family needs to be abolished and want a system of separatism.
    - Also argue for Political Lesbianism because heterosexual relationships.
36
Q

What is Greer’s view as a radical feminist?

A

Matrilocal households - all female households with shared parental responsibility.

37
Q

What is a criticism for the radical feminist view of the family?

A

Sommerville - radical feminists fail to see the improvements that have been made to women’s experiences of the family. Better access to divorce & control over their fertility women are not longer trapped by family.
- She also argues that separatism is unobtainable due to heterosexual attraction.

38
Q

What’s the marxist feminist view of the family?

A

Marxist feminists see the family as a tool of capitalism and that it is capitalism not men who oppress women.

39
Q

In what three ways do marxist feminists see the family as oppressing women whilst supporting capitalism?

A
  1. Women reproduce the workforce and socialise them into social hierarchy.
  2. Women absorb the anger of men who are frustrated by their alienation and exploitation. Ansley - Women are takers of shit.
  3. Women are a reserve army of cheap labour that can be activated when they are needed and let go when no longer needed - e.g. WWII.
40
Q

What is a criticism of the marxist feminist view of the family?

A

Women are no longer a reserve labour force as they have equal rights at work and are as likely as men to be the main breadwinner in the family.

41
Q

What’s the interactionist feminist view of the family?

A
  1. Other feminist beliefs focus on the experience of women in a nuclear family > not all families are nuclear. Not all women will have the same experience of family life.
    - A Black woman may find her family provide a refuge from societal racism rather than it being a place of oppression or negativity.
42
Q

What’s a criticism of the interactionist feminist view of the family?

A
  1. Neglects the fact that many women do share the same experiences of family regardless of ethnicity or social class.
    - They all face a risk of domestic violence and low pay.
43
Q

What are two sociologists for the personal life perspective?

A

Carol Smart & Petra Nordqvist

44
Q

What is the DEFINITION of family by personal life perspective?

A
  • Beyond the ties of blood and marriage. E.g. a person may not feel close to their sibling so would not help in a crisis but may do this for a friend.
  • Without knowing the meaning behind the relationship we are unable to know how someone would behave.
45
Q

What is the personal life perspective on the family?

A
  1. By focusing on the meanings behind the relationships > we choose the families that we want and need, but these are based on past experiences rather than an open choice.
46
Q

What did Smart & Nordqvist look into?

A
  1. Donor conceived children to explain the importance of the social relationship over the genetic relationship.
    - Mothers definition of being a mother > linked to the time taken to raise their child than the cell that started the process.
47
Q

What are criticisms of the personal life perspective?

A
  1. Can be accused of taking too broad a view. Possible to overlook what is special about relationships which are based on blood and marriage ties.
  2. Exaggerates how much choice people have about family.
    - Traditional social structures > weakened but do still exist and will influence peoples choices.
48
Q

What are 3 Postmodernists on family?

A

Giddens, Beck and Stacey

49
Q

What is Giddens & Beck’s view of the family?

A

Individualisation Thesis
- Traditional social structures > lost influence over peoples actions and decisions.
- People now free from traditional roles and structures > choose the family that meets our needs and wants.

50
Q

What does Giddens argue that the individualisation thesis is caused by?

A
  • Caused by advancements > availability of contraception and female independence > Changed the basis of couples relationships - Pure Relationships.
51
Q

What’s Stacey’s view on the family?

A
  1. Greater freedom and choice > benefitted women > free themselves from patriarchal oppression and shape their family for their needs.
    - Interviews in Silicon Valley > women who have led the change in family structures, roles and responsibilities rather than men.
52
Q

What is the new family type Stacey argues?

A
  1. Divorce-Extended family > Ex-In Law, Ex Partner and their new partner > No longer connected by blood or marriage will still help each other financially and domestically.
53
Q

What are criticisms of the postmodernist view of the family?

A
  1. May - ‘Beck and Giddens view of the individual is simply an idealised version of white middle class man.’
  2. Smart - Connectedness Thesis - People are social beings who live in a web of connectedness and relationships > strongly influence and shape our range of options and choices.

Families and Households (8 decks)

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