Famillies and households

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  • Created on: 22-04-16 09:21
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  • Families & Households
    • The domestic division of Labour
      • Parsons
        • Instrumental & expressive roles
          • The husband has the instrumental role, geared towards success at work so he can provide for the family financially
          • The wife has an expressive role, geared towards primary socialisation of the children and meeting the families emotional needs. She is the homemaker
          • Parsons argues that the division of labour is based on biological differences, with the woman 'naturally' suited to the nurturing role and men to that of the provider
      • Bott
        • Joint conjugal roles
          • Where the couple shares tasks such as housework and childcare and spend leisure time together
        • Segregated conjugal roles
          • Where the couple have separate roles. Male is breadwinner and female is the homemaker
      • Young & Willmott
        • The symmetrical family
          • The family takes on similar roles, although not symmetrical, are much more similar
          • More common among younger couples
            • See a rise of the symmetrical nuclear family as a result of major social changes that have taken place during the past century
              • Change in woman's position
              • Geographical mobility
              • New technology
              • Higher standards of living
        • March of progress view
      • The feminist view of housework
        • Reject march of progress view. They see this inequality as stemming from the fact that the family and society are male-dominated or patriarchal
          • Women occupy a subordinate and dependent role within the family and in wider society
        • Ann Oakley
          • Criticizes Young and Willmotts view that the family is symmetrical. The question is hardly convincing evidence of a symmetrical family.
          • Found the housewife role is still the primary role
    • The impact of paid work
      • Gershuny
        • The trends towards equality
          • Wives who did not go to work did 83% of the housework and even wives who worked part-time still do 82%
          • Wives who worked full-time did 73% of the housework. The longer she has been in paid work the more likely the husband does housework
          • Couples whose parents had a more equal relationship were likely to share housework more equally themselves
          • Gershuny explains the trend toward greater equality in term of a gradual change in values and parental role models
            • Argues that the social values are gradually adapting to the fact that women are now working full time.
          • Lesbians couples and gender scripts
            • Dunne
              • Argues that the division of labour continues because of deeply ingrained 'gender scripts'
                • Expectations and norms that are set out the different gender roles men and women in heterosexual couples are expected to play
                  • Dunne contrasts this with the situation among lesbian couples, where gender scripts do not operate in the same way.
                    • Dunne found symmetry in lesbian relationships. Household tasks are not linked to specific gender scripts. This allows lesbian couples to create a more equal relationship.
                      • Weeks argues that same-sex relationships offer greater possibilities of equality because the division of labour is open to negotiation and agreement, and not based on patriarchal tradition
      • The commercialization of housework
        • Housework has become commercialized  - goods are services that housewives previously had to produce themselves are now mass produced
        • Women working means that they can afford to buy these good and services
      • The dual burden
        • Feminists argue that , despite women working there is little evidence of a 'new man' who does equal share of domestic work
          • They argue that women have simply acquired a dual burden of paid work and unpaid housework
            • The family remain patriarchal . Men benefit from both women's earnings and from their domestic labour
        • Emotional work
          • Emotional work describes work whose main feature is the management of one's own and other people's emotions
    • Decision making
      • Pooling - where both partners have access to income and joint responsibility.
      • Allowance system - where men give their wives an allowance system out of which they have to budget to meet the family's needs, with the man retaining any surplus income for himself
      • Vogler and Pahl
        • Argue that the reason men are likely to take decisions is that they earn more
          • Feminists argue that inequalities in decisions are not the result of inequalities in earnings. They argue that in a patriarchal society, the cultural definition of men as decision-makers is deeply ingrained in both men and women and are instilled through gender role socialisation
      • Edgell
        • Very important decisions (finance) made by the husband alone
        • Important decisions (childrens education)  made jointly or seldom by wife alone
        • Less important decisions (choice of home) made by the wife
    • Domestic violence
      • Domestic violence does not occur randomly but follows a particular social pattern and these have social causes. The most striking of these patterns is that it is mainly violence by men against women
      • Mirrlees- Black
        • Most victims are women
          • 99% of all incidents against women are committed  by men
            • Nearly one in four women has been assaulted by a partner at some point in her life and one in eight repeatedly so.
      • Dobash
        • Radical feminist view - evidence of patriarchy

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