family diversity - extended

Question 1

What are the arguments that extended family IS important today?

Answer 1

• Willmott: it continues to exist as a ‘dispersed extended family’ (relatives geographically separated but maintain frequent contact - visits/phone calls
• Chamberlain: Caribbean families, while geographically dispersed, still provide support. ‘multiple nuclear families’
• Bell: WC/MC still rely on wider kin for support (MC- financial, WC - more frequent contact/domestic help), bean pole - extended vertically not horizontally

Question 2

What arguments are there that the extended family ISNT important today?

Answer 2

• Parsons: in a modern industrial society, it has been replaced by the nuclear family
• Charles: study of Swansea - three generations living together is now ‘all but extinct’, the only exception were among the city’s Bangladeshi community

Question 3

What is Willmott’s argument that the extended family IS important today?

Answer 3

It continues to exist as a ‘dispersed extended family’ (relatives geographically separated but maintain frequent contact - visits/phone calls

Question 4

What is Chamberlain’s argument that the extended family IS important today?

Answer 4

Caribbean families, while geographically dispersed, still provide support. ‘multiple nuclear families’, where siblings, uncles, cousins continue to provide support in child-rearing

Question 5

What is Bell’s argument that the extended family IS important today?

Answer 5

WC/MC still rely on wider kin for support
- MC- financial; father to son,
- WC - more frequent contact/domestic help; mother to daughter
bean pole - extended vertically not horizontally

Question 6

What is Parsons’s argument that the extended family IS important today?

Answer 6

In a modern industrial society, it has been replaced by the geographically and socially mobile nuclear family

Question 7

What is Charles’s argument that the extended family IS important today?

Answer 7

Study of Swansea - three generations living together is now ‘all but extinct’, the only exception were among the city’s Bangladeshi community