Topic 6 Family diversity

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  • Created by: Ali682
  • Created on: 18-02-19 19:27
Functionalism
According to Talcott Parsons there is a functional fit between the nuclear family and modern society.
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How does Parson see the nuclear family?
Sees the nuclear family as uniquely suited to meeting the needs of modern society for a geographically and socially mobile workforce and performing 2 irreducible functions the primary socialisation of children and stabalisation of adult personalities
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What perspective do the New right hold on the family?
The New Right have a conservative and anti-feminist perspective on the family. They are firmly opposed to family diversity.
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How do the New Right see the nuclear family?
They see this family as 'natural' and based on fundamental biological differences between men and women. In their view this family is the cornerstone of society: a place of refuge, contentment and harmony.
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What do The New Right oppose of?
They oppose of cohabitation, gay marriage and lone parenthood.
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What are The New Right concerned about?
They are concerned about the growth of lone-parent families, which they see as resulting from the breakdown of couple relationships. They see lone-parent families as harmful to children.
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What do The New Right argue?
Lone mothers cannot discipline their children properly. Lone-parent families leaves boys without an adult male role model, resulting in educational failure, delinquency and social instability. Such families are also likely to be poorer and a burden.
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What do The New Right claim as the main cause of lone-parent families?
They claim that the main cause of lone-parent families is the collapse of relationships between cohabiting couples.
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Harry Benson (2006)
Analysed data on the parents of over 15,000 babies. He found that over the first 3 years of the babys life the rate of the family breakdown was much higher among cohabiting couples.
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Benson (2010:2011)
Argues that couples are more stable when they are married. For example the rate of divorce among married couples is lower than the rate of breakups among cohabiting couples.
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Benson (2010:2011) (2)
In Benson's view marriage is more stable because it requires a deliberate commitment to each other, whereas cohabitation allows partners to avoid commitment and responsibility.
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What do New right thinkers and Conservative politicians argue?
They argue that only a return to 'traditional values' including the value of marriage can prevent social disintegration and damage to children. They regard laws and policies such as easy access to divorce, gay marriage and widespread availability of
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What do New right thinkers and Conservative politicians argue? (2)
welfare benefits as undermining the conventional family. Therefore Benson argues that government needs to encourage couples to marry by means of policies that support marriage.
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What are the criticisms of the New Right?
The feminist Ann Oakley (1997) argues that the New Right wrongly assume that husbands and wives' roles are fixed by biology. Feminists argue that the conventional nuclear family favored by the New Right is based on the patriarchal oppression of women
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What are the criticisms of the New Right? (2)
and is a fundamental cause of gender inequality. Critics of the New Right argue that there is no evidence that children in lone-parent families are more likely to be delinquent than those brought up in a 2 parent family of the same social class.
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Robert Chester (1985)
Recognises that there has been some increased family diversity in recent years. However unlike the New Right he does not regard this as very significant nor does he see it in a negative light.
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What does Chester argue?
He argues that the only important change is a move from the dominance of the traditional or conventional nuclear family, to what he describes as the 'neo-conventional family'.
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What does Chester mean by the conventional family?
By the conventional family Chester means the type of nuclear family described by the New Right and Parsons with its division of labour between a male breadwinner and a female homemaker.
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What does Chester define the neo-conventional as?
He defines it as a dual-earner family in which both spouses go out to work and not just the husband.
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What do Rhona and Robert Rapoport (1982) argue?
They argue that diversity is of central importance in understanding family life today. They believe that we have moved away from the traditional nuclear family as the dominant family type.
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What are the five different types of family diversity?
Organisational diversity, Cultural diversity, social class diversity, life stage diversity and generational diversity.
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What is organisational diversity?
This refers to differences in the ways family roles are organised. For example, some couples have joint conjugal roles and two-wage earners, while others have segregated conjugal roles and one-wage earner.
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What is cultural diversity?
Different cultural, religious and ethnic groups have different family structures. For example, there is a higher proportion of female-headed lone parent families among African-Caribbean households.
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What is social class diversity?
Differences in family structure are partly the result of income differences between households of different social classes. Likewise there are class differences in child-rearing practices.
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What is life-stage diversity?
Family structures differ according to the stage reached in the life stage. For example young newlyweds, couples with dependent children, retired couples whose children have grown up and left home and widows who are living alone.
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What is generational diversity?
Older and younger generations have different attitudes and experiences that reflect the historical periods in which they have lived. For example, they may have different views about the morality of divorce or cohabitation.
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What is a 'top down' view?
Modernist approaches take a structural or 'top down' view. That is they see the family as a structure that shapes the behaviour of its members so that they can perform the functions society requires.
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What does Judith Stacey (1998) argue?
She argues that greater freedom and choice has benefited women. It has enabled them to free themselves from patriarchal oppression and to shape their family arrangements to meet their needs.
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What does David Morgan (1996;2011) argue?
It is pointless trying to make large scale generalisations about the family as if it were a single thing.
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What have Giddens and Beck explored the effects of?
Giddens and Beck explore the effects of increasing individual choice upon families and relationships. Their views have therefore become known as the individualisation thesis.
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What do the individualisation thesis argue?
The individualisation thesis argues that traditional social structures such as class, gender and family have lost much of their influence over us. According to the thesis, in the past peoples lives were defined by fixed roles that largely prevented
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What do the individualisation thesis argue? (2)
them from choosing their own life course. For example, everyone was expected to marry and to take up their appropriate gender role.
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What does Anthony Giddens (1992) argue?
He argues that in recent decades the family and marriage have been transformed by greater choice and a more equal relationship between men and women.
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What does Anthony Giddens (1992) argue? (2)
Argues that in the past traditional family relationships were held together by external forces such as the laws governing the marriage contract and by powerful norms against divorce and sex outside of marriage.
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The key feature of the pure relationship...
Is that it exists solely to satisfy each partner's needs. As a result, the relationship is likely to survive only so long as both partners think it is in their own interest to do so.
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What does Ulrich Beck (1992) argue?
Beck argues that we now live in a 'risk society' where tradition has less influence and people have more choice.
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Ulrich Beck and Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim (1995) negotiated family
Negotiated families do not conform to the traditional family norm, but vary according to the wishes and expectations of their members, who decide what is best for themselves by negotiation.
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Negotiated family
However although the negotiated family is more equal than the patriarchal family, it is less stable. This is because individuals are more free to leave if their needs are not met.
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The zombie family
Although in today's uncertain risk society people turn to the family in the hope of finding security, in reality family relationships are themselves now subject to greater risk and uncertainty. So Beck describes the family as a zombie category.
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The personal life perspective
Sociologists who take a personal life perspective such as Carol Smart (2007) and Vanessa May (2013) agree that there is now more family diversity but they disagree with Beck and Giddens' explanation of it.
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What are the criticisms of the individualisation thesis?
Firstly the individualisation thesis exaggerates how much choice people have about family relationships today. As Shelly Budgeon (2011) notes, this reflects the neoliberal ideology that individuals today have complete freedom of choice.
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What are the criticisms of the individualisation thesis? (2)
Secondly the thesis wrongly sees people as disembedded, free floating, independent individuals. It ignores the fact that our decisions and choices about personal relationships are made within a social context.
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What are the criticisms of the individualisation thesis? (3)
Thirdly the individualisation thesis ignores the importance of structural factors such as social class inequalities and patriarchal gender norms in limiting and shaping our relationship choices.
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The connectedness thesis
Instead of seeing us as disembedded, isolated individuals with limitless choice about personal relationships Smart argues that we are fundamental social beings whose choices are always made 'within a web of connectedness'.
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The connectedness thesis (2)
According to the connectedness thesis we live within networks of existing relationships and interwoven personal histories and these strongly influence our range of options and choices in relationships.
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Finch and Mason's (1993) study
Their study of extended families found that although individuals can to some extent negotiate the relationships they want they are also embedded within the family connections and obligations that restrict their freedom of choice.
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The connectedness thesis (3)
Emphasises the role of the class and gender structures in which we are embedded. These structures limit our choices about the kinds of relationships, identities and families we can create for ourselves.
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Card 2

Front

How does Parson see the nuclear family?

Back

Sees the nuclear family as uniquely suited to meeting the needs of modern society for a geographically and socially mobile workforce and performing 2 irreducible functions the primary socialisation of children and stabalisation of adult personalities

Card 3

Front

What perspective do the New right hold on the family?

Back

Preview of the front of card 3

Card 4

Front

How do the New Right see the nuclear family?

Back

Preview of the front of card 4

Card 5

Front

What do The New Right oppose of?

Back

Preview of the front of card 5
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