Chapter 11: Families and Intimate Relationships

family - group of persons directly linked by kin connections

• form economic unit

• adult members assume responsibility for caring for children

kinship - connections among individuals established through marriage, adoption, lines of descent that connect blood relatives

marriage - socially and legally acknowledged and approved sexual union between two individuals

• become kin to each other

nuclear family - two adults living together in household with biological or adopted children

extended family - close relatives live in same household as or maintain close and cntinuous relationship with nuclear family

• ex. grandparents, brothers, sisters, spouses

families of orientation - family which person is born or adopted

families of procreation - family one enters as adult for those who have children

monogamy - married to one individual at a time

polygamy - marriage that allows person have mroe than one spouse

polygyny - man married to more than one woman at a time

polyandry - woman may have two or more husbands at a time

primary socialization - process young children learn culltural norms of society into which they are born

personality stabilization - role families play in assisting adult family members emotionally

consensus theory - society is collective expression of shared norms and values

• people choose to play roles rather than excersize choices available to them because they want a more harmonious existence

• predicated on idea there is good reason for status quo

  • maintains inequalities

  • perspective people in power use to maintain dominance

conflict theory - focus on competing interests of family members to understand family problems

• can explain how men gain and keep power in family

• ex. divorce, finances, childrearing, adultery, addiction

feminist theory - modern conflict theory seeks to understand inequality between men and women

• male dominance within family part of wider system of male power in society

• neither natural nor inevitable and occurs at cost to women

second shift - women work outside home and come home to work second shift of unpaid labor

• women do majority of work in hetero pairings

• ex. cleaning, childcare, cooking

exchange theory - sees individuals or groups with different resources, strengths, weaknesses entering into mutual relationships to maximize their own gain

• individuals are rational

• consider cost/benifits of any relationship

• may reduce all relationships to economic transaction

  • trading something of “value” in exchange for something they want in return

• ex. rich spouse/pretty spouse, working spouse/homemaker

Cult of True Womanhood - created family considered traditional

• only achievable by upper classes

• only worked when companies paid family wages

• ex. breadwinner/homemaker myth

hooking up - casual sex/romantic encounter without explicit commitment or exclusivity

• treated as deviant although it is too widespread to be truly deviant

stepfamily - family at least one partner has children from previous relationship

• number greater than official stats as stats refer to children living full time

cohabitation - couple lives together in sexual relationship without being married

• can be substitute for marriage

• stage in process of relationship building precedes marriage

second parent adoption - one partner adopts child and partner applies to be second or co-parent

joint adoption - partners adopt child together