Postmodernism/Family diversity

Modernist view of FD

• Nuclear family remains the norm, still influenced by fixed structures

• It fits society best and benefits its individual members

New Right

• Nuclear family ‘fits’ society

• Nuclear family is under threat from social policies embracing family diversity e.g. civil partnerships, divorce law, benefits

• Dennis & Erdos: Children from lone parent families/fatherless families, boys grow up to rebel, inadequately socialised

• Murray: Lone parent families lead to an underclass, dependency culture, perverse incentive

Rapoports - 5 types of family diversity CLOGS

• Cultural diversity e.g. more female headed Afro-Carribbean families

• Life-stage e.g. newly-weds, retired - children left home

• Organisational e.g. joint/segregated conjugal roles

• Generational e.g. are your views about family life different to that of your grandparents

• Social class e.g. income and childbearing can differ according to income

Barrow - FD in black families

• Matriarchal families - ‘mother households (or grandmother in charge)

• Adult males contribute to childcare, but most support from wider female kinship group

• Black Caribbean and black African families —> higher proportion of lone parent households

• Male unemployment, poverty → black men less able to provide for families

South Asian families in Britain - Ballard

• Tends to be more patriarchal (low divorce, more arranged marriage, close family connections)

• Traditionally extended (large families)

• When migrated to Britain, women needed paid work, extended families split into nuclear units, but relatives still all close by

Evidence nuclear family under threat

• Divorce rates

• Men and women living alone

• Births outside marriages

• Couples cohabiting

• Marriage on the decline

• Alternative family types (lone parent, one person, same sex)

• Remarriages

• Ethnic diversity

Evidence nuclear family not under threat

• Young & Willmott: Still nuclear, just domestic division of labour more equal (Symmetrical family)

• Chester: Most people not choosing alternative family types, nuclear remains ideal. Dual earner families become popular, where both partners go out to work (similar to symmetrical family).

  • Life cycles mean that at one point or another, most people will be part of a nuclear family at some stage

  • Cohabitation more common as it is seen as a ‘trial marriages

Morgan - PM

• We construct our own life course

• Families are not structures - they are simply what people choose to do

Stacey - PM

• Fictive kin, divorce extended family

• New types of family have freed women from patriarchal oppression → can shape family to meet their needs

Beck - PM

• Traditional social structures and roles have weakened, leading individuals to have more freedom and choice in shaping their Ives (they can choose, as the individual)

• Now been ‘disembedded’ from traditional roles → can choose how to live our lives (class, gender and family has lost their influence upon our life course

• Risk society - tradition has no influence - calculate risk and reward open to us

• We now have ‘negotiated families’ - does not confirm to the traditional nuclear family norm, but vary according to the wishes and expectations of their members, who decide what is best for them by discussion

Giddens - PM

• Postmodern society = confluent love. Relationships now based on love and emotions and intimacy, rather than tradition, duty and obligation, greater choice - couples define their relationship for themselves - pure relationships

• Contraception has allowed sex and intimacy in a relationship rather than reproduction

Postmodernism

• Postmodern family = freedom to choose; both the structure types of roles in family e.g. same sex families, lone parent families, reconstituted families in postmodernity

• In favour of a ‘pick and mix’ society and family diversity, celebrating both difference and choice

Smart - PL criticism of Beck

• Connectedness thesis

• Our choices influenced by our ‘web of connectedness’ - we are influenced by existing relationships and personal histories e.g. family influence, cultural influence