Topic 7 - Family Diversity Flashcards
Who believes that diversity is essential to understand the family today?
Rapports
Diversity is of central importance in understanding family life, they believe we have moved away from the traditional nuclear family as the dominant type, to a range of different families — in which culture and lifestyles are more diverse
Family diversity reflects greater freedom of choice & the widespread acceptance of cultures and ways of life
Who outlines 5 types of family diversity?
Rapoports
Organisational diversity — refers to differences in the ways family roles are organised, for example, some couples have joint conjugal roles & two wage earners whilst others have the opposite
Cultural diversity — different cultural, religious & ethnic groups have different family structures. Eg: higher proportion of lone parent families among African-Carribbean households & higher extended families among Asians
Social class diversity — differences in family structure are party due to income differences between households of different classes
Life stage diversity — family structures differ according to the stage reached in the life cycle, eg; young newlyweds, couples with dependent children, retired couples whose children have grown up, widows who are living alone
Generational diversity — older & younger generations have different attitudes and experiences that reflect historical periods in which they have lived, eg; different views about divorce or cohabitation
What is the new rights perspective of the family?
Murray
- Opposed to family diversity
- See traditional nuclear family as the superior family type & most ‘natural’ one & based on biological differences between men and women
- This family is the cornerstone of society
- Decline of nuclear marriage & growth of family diversity is the reason for many issues in society
- Lone parent families are harmony for children;
- Lone mothers cannot discipline their children properly
- Lone families leave boys without a male role model, resulting in educational failure and delinquency
- Lone families are likely to be poorer thus a burden on welfare state and taxpayers
Which new right thinker says that couples are more stable when they’re married?
Benson
Couples are more stable when they’re married, for example the rate of divorce among married couples is lower than the rate of breakups among married couples
Marriage is more stable because it requires commitment to each other and responsibility whereas cohabitation does not uphold these values
Who says greater freedom and choice has benefitted women & why?
Stacey
Greater freedom and choice has benefitted women, enabled them to free themselves of patriarchal oppression & shape their family arrangements to suit their needs
Used life history interviews to construct a series of case studies of postmodern families — found that women rather than men have been the main agents of change in the family
Eg; many of the housewives she interviewed rejected the traditional housewife-mother role — they worked, returned to education as adults, improved job prospects, remarried, divorced
These women often created new types of family that better suited their needs
One of the new family structures Stacey calls ‘divorce extended family’ whose members are connected through divorce rather than marriage
Who explains that individual choice has influenced family diversity and how?
Giddens & Beck
Explore the effects of individual personal choice upon families and households, views are known as the individualisation thesis
Argues that traditional social structures such as class, gender and the family have lost much influence over us, in the past peoples lives were defined by fixed roles that large prevented them from choosing their own life course, for example people being expected to marry and take up the appropriate gender role
We have now become ‘disembedded’ from traditional roles and structures leaving us with more freedom to choose how to lead our lives
Eval for individualisation thesis
Budgeon — thesis exaggerates how much choice people gave about families and relationships today, this reflects the neoliberal ideology that people today have complete freedom of choice, when in reality traditional norms that limit. People’s relationships choices have not weakened as much as the thesis claims
Who argues that families have been transformed by greater choice?
Giddens
Marriage & family have been transformed by greater choice and more equal relationships between men and women
This transformation has occurred because:
- Contraception has allowed sex and intimacy rather than reproduction to become the main reason for the relationships existence
- Women have gained independence as a result of feminism and due to greater opportunities in eduction and work
As a result the basis for marriage and family has changed, in the past, relationships were held together by external forces such as laws governing the marriage contract
By contrast, today couples are free to define their relationships themselves, for example, marriage is no longer seen as an obligation and divorce is readily accessible
What type of society do we live now? & how is the patriarchal nuclear family undermined? And what is it replaced with?
Beck
We now live in a risk society, where tradition has less influence and people have more choice, we are more aware of risks because making choices involves calculating the risks and rewards of different options available to us
Contrasts with earlier times when people’s roles were more fixed by tradition and rigid social norms which dictated how people should behave
Eg; people expected to marry for life, man be breadwinner & provide for the family, female homemaker, socialise children
1) — greater gender equality, which has challenged male domination in all spheres of life, women now expect equality both at work and in the home
2) — greater individualism, where people’s actions are influenced more by calculation of their own self interests rather than by a sense of obligation of others
These trends have led to nuclear family being replaced by ‘negotiated family’ — does not conform to the traditional family norm but vary according to the wishes and expectations of its members, decide what best for themselves by negotiations, enter relationship on an equal basis
What is meant by the zombie family?
Beck
Families and relationships are now subjected to greater risk and uncertainty then before, describes the family as a ‘zombie category’ it appears to be alive but in reality is dead
People want it to be a haven of security in an insecure world, but todays family cannot provide this because of its own instability
Who argues there is limited evidence for family diversity?
Chester
Although many people are not part of a nuclear family, this is due to the life cycle, many people currently living in a one person household, such as elderly widows, divorced men or young people who have not yet married, were either part of a nuclear family in the past, or will be in one in the future
Identifies the following patterns;
- most people live in a household headed by a married couple
- most adults marry and have children
- most marriages continue until death
Nuclear family is still the dominant type
