Families and Households Topic 5 - theories/roles of the family Flashcards
(26 cards)
Organic analogy
Functionalists see society as a body made up of different interconnected organs, these organs represent the different institutions within society, in this case the family
Murdock (1949) sees the family as performing four essential functions:
- Stable satisfaction of the sex drive: with the same partner preventing social disruption caused by a sexual free-for-all
- Reproduction of the next generation: without which society could not continue
- Socialisation of the young: into society’s shared norms and values
- Meeting its members economic needs: such as food and shelter
AO3 for Murdock’s (1949) family functions
Marxists and feminists - criticise Murdock for his ‘rose-tinted’ harmonious consensus view and argue he neglects the conflict and exploitation in the family
Feminists - family oppresses women
Marxists - family meets the needs of capitalism not the family members
‘Functional fit’ theory (one theorist)
Parsons (1955) - a key functionalist theorist who argues that the functions a family performs will depend on the society in which it is found. The family performs a ‘functional fit’ to the needs of society. Distinguishes between two family types:
- Nuclear family -> parents and dependent children
- Extended family -> three generations living under one roof
Geographically mobile workforce
Pre-industrial society people spent their whole lives in the same village, in contrast modern industrial societies constantly spring up and decline in different parts of the country and world. This means people need to move to where the jobs are. Parsons argues the nuclear family is far more compact and easier to move than an extended family.
Socially mobile workforce (one theorist)
Modern industrial society is constantly evolving and so it needs a skilled workforce, therefore it is essential that talented people are able to win promotions.
In modern society status is achieved through efforts which makes social mobility possible.
- Parsons says that a nuclear family is better because in an extended family the son lives at home and the father has a higher achieved status. However in order to avoid conflict the son must leave home, marry and form a nuclear family.
AO3 for types of industrial society families (one theorist)
Laslett argues that in pre-industrial society late childbearing age and short life expectancy meant that grandparents were unlikely to be alive after the birth of their grandchildren, meaning the family was more likely nuclear.
Loss of functions (one theorist)
According to Parsons, when society changed to industrial, the family also changed its functions. It no longer needed to be a unit of production, as a result the modern nuclear family performed two functions:
- The primary socialisation of children: to equip them with the skills and society’s values in order to enable them to cooperate with others and integrate in to society
- The stabilisation of adult personalities: the family is a place where adults can relax and release tensions, enables them to return to work refreshed
Key Marxists beliefs on family
Society based on conflict (as oppose to consensus like functionalists) which stems from the unequal class structures between:
The bourgeoisie -> the capitalist class who own the means of production
The proletariat -> the working class who own nothing but their labour which capitalists exploit
Marxists see all society’s institutions - education, media, religion, and the state as helping to maintain class inequality. Family functions are performed purely to benefit capitalism
Inheritance of property (Marxist function of family)
The key to determining the shape of society is the mode of production - those who own and control society’s productive forces - is the capitalist class.
When the forces of production started to evolve and society started to become industrialised, the concept of private property emerged as a class of men secured means over production.
- Monogamy/the nuclear family was essential because of the inheritance of private property, men had to ensure legitimate heirs
Ideological function (Marxist function of family, one theorist)
Marxists says the family also performs key ideological functions for capitalism, ideology meaning a set of ideas or beliefs that justify inequality and maintain the capitalist system:
1. Socialising children into the idea that hierarchy and inequality are inevitable e.g. parents have power over children
2. Zaretsky (1976) also argues that the family performs in ideological function by offering an apparent ‘haven’ from the harsh exploitative world of capitalism
A unit of consumption (Marxist function of the family)
Capitalism exploits the labour of workers by gaining profit by paying their workers less then the value of the commodities they produce. The family are therefore integral from capitalists:
- Advertisers urge families to ‘keep up with the joneses’ by consuming the latest products
- The media targets children who use ‘pester power’ to persuade parents to spend money
- Children who lack the latest clothes or ‘must have’ gadgets are mocked and stigmatised by their peers
AO3 criticisms of Marxists family functions
Marxists tend to assume that the nuclear family is dominant in a capitalist society.
- Feminists argue that the Marxist emphasis on class and capitalism underestimates the power of gender inequalities. In the feminist eyes gender inequalities are more fundamental than class inequalities
- Functionalists argue that Marxists ignore the positive benefits that family performs for its members
Key feminists beliefs on family
Feminists take a conflict view of family, they argue it oppresses women and they focus on things such as the unequal division of labour and domestic violence against women. They regard gender inequality as being socially constructed by society. There are four different types of feminists with different views
Liberal feminist family beliefs
They believe in campaigning for equal rights and opportunities for women e.g. equal pay act. They believe that:
- Women’s oppression being gradually overcome through changing attitudes and through changes to the law
- We are moving further towards greater equality
- ‘March of progress’ taking place, more men are now involved in domestic work and there is a more equal balance in the socialisation of children
AO3 criticism for liberal feminists
Other feminists criticise them for failing to challenge the underlying cause of women’s oppression and for believing that changes in the law are in people’s attitudes will be enough to bring equality
Marxist and radical feminists believe that far reaching changes to deep-rooted social structures are needed
Marxist feminists family beliefs (one theorist)
Argue that the main cause of women’s oppression in the family is not men but capitalism. Women’s oppression serves capitalism in three ways:
- Women reproduce the labour force - through their unpaid domestic labour by socialising the next generation of workers
- Women absorb anger - Ansley (1972) describes wives as ‘takers of shit’ who soak up the frustrations that their husbands feel because they’re exploited at work
- Women are the reserve army of cheap labour - taken on when extra workers are needed, when no longer needed employers can let them go to return to their primary role of unpaid labour
Radical feminists family beliefs (one theorist)
They strongly believe that all societies have been founded on patriarchy:
1. Men are the enemy - they are the source of women’s oppression and exploitation
2. The family and marriage are the key institutions in a patriarchal society - men benefit from women’s unpaid domestic labour and sexual services, they dominate women through domestic and sexual violence
3. Believe the patriarchal system needs to be overturned, in particular the family. ‘Political lesbianism’ and separatism. Greer (2002) argues that ‘matrifocal’ (all-female) are the preferred family type
AO3 criticism for radical feminists (one theorist)
Liberal feminists such as Somerville (2000) argue radical feminists fail to recognise the fact that women’s positions have improved.
Also argues that heterosexual attraction makes it unlikely that separatism would work.
Difference feminist family beliefs
Up to now the feminist approaches we have looked at all assume that women share a similar experience in the family.
Difference feminists argue that we cannot generalise about women’s experiences, they argue that lesbian and heterosexual women, white and black women, middle class and working class women all have very different experiences of the family and society.
AO3 criticism for difference feminists
Other feminists argue that difference feminists neglect the fact that all women share many of the same experiences e.g. risk of domestic violence and sexual assault
By breaking down the feminists movement into smaller sub groups you run the risk of watering down the movement
The personal life perspective
Argues that all other perspective suffer from two weaknesses:
1. They tend to assume the traditional nuclear family is the dominant family type - this ignores the increased diversity of families
2. They are all structural theories - assume we are all passive puppets manipulated by the structures of society
The sociology of personal life
Strongly influenced by the interactionist theory where we must start from the point of view of the individual and what families and relationships mean to them. ‘Bottom-up’ approach which emphasises the meanings individuals give to their actions.
Beyond ties of blood and marriage (PLP, one theorist)
Takes a wider view of relationships than just the ‘traditional family’ e.g. a women might not feel close to her own sister and unwilling to support her in a crisis, but at the same time may be prepared to care for someone who is not related. Focuses on the range of personal relationships that might not be conventionally defined as ‘family’:
- Relationships with friends
- Fictive kin, close friends treated as relatives
- Gay and lesbian ‘chosen families’
- Relationships with dead relatives
- Relationships with pets, e.g. Tipper (2011) found children frequently saw their pets as ‘part of their family’
