SOC VOCAB chapter 12

Family

a group of individuals who are related in some way, usually living together, engaging in sex, having responsibility for rearing children, and functioning as an economic unit

Nuclear family

a social unit composed of a husband, wife, and their children

Family orientation

the nuclear family into which a person is born

Family of procreation

a person, a spouse, and their children

Blended or reconstituted family

a form of family in which spouses and their children from former marriages live together as a single nuclear family

Binuclear family

a family form in which each member of a divorced couple establishes a separate household between their children divide their time

Extended family

a family composed of two or more generations of kin that functions as an independent social and economic unit

Kinship

a network of people who are related by marriage, blood, or social practice (such as adoption)

Affinal relationship

social bonds based on marriage

Marriage

a state that occurs when two individuals are involved in a socially approved relationship that involves intimate, mutual long-term obligations, and they have fulfilled the customary ceremonial or legal requirements

Romantic love

an emotional identification between two individuals so intense that they are convinced that they cannot be happy without each other

Courtship

the relationship between a male and a female who are preparing for marriage to each other

Endogamy

marriage in which the couple are members of the same race, ethnicity, religion, or social class

Exogamy

marriage in which the couple are from different races, ethnic groups, religious, or social class

Propinquity

physical closeness

Monogamy

a marriage consisting of one male spouse and one female spouse

Polygamy

a marriage consisting of multiple spouses

Descent

the system by which kinship is traced over generations

Serial monogamy

a cultural pattern that permits a person to have more than one spouse, but not at the same time

Cohabitation

a situation in which partners share a household and engage in intimate social and sexual relations without being formally married

Machismo

a value system embracing highly masculine behaviors and including a double standard

Divorce

the dissolution of the legal ties that bind a married couple; socially it constitutes the recognition that the marriage is over

Desertion

the social dissolution of marriage that occurs when one spouse leaves the other or simply walks away from the marriage for a prolonged period