postmodernism Flashcards
(4 cards)
individualisation thesis
While not accepting that we are in postmodern society, Giddens and Beck are influenced by postmodernist ideas about how society has changed. They have applied these ideas to family life.
They are interested in the effects of increased choice on personal relationships. These ideas have become known as the individualisation thesis
This thesis argues that in the past, people’s lives were dictated by roles or social structures like class, gender or ethnicity – this prevented people from choosing their own life-course
In the past, people were expected to marry and take up their appropriate gender role
Today, people are not required to follow these roles – there are fewer certainties
We have therefore become ‘disembedded’ from traditional roles, leaving us with freedom to choose a lifestyle
Beck says that the ‘standard biography’ or lifecourse has been replaced with the ‘do it yourself biography’ which individuals construct for themselves
This has huge implications for family diversity
Beck - negotiated family
Further to the Beck point above, he argues that the
roles and expectations of each family member varies depending on the needs of each individual family
In this sense, the role a person plays in a family is a ‘negotiation’ between themselves and the needs of family. A teenager could be carer for disabled parent, the role of a father will alter if there is a divorce and the expectations from divorced parents will change in how they view the choices their children make about who to spend time with.
In this sense, there is more freedom in family life yet also more uncertainty in what is expected from
parents and other family members. Beck believes this is part of the ‘risk society’ where family ties are more unpredictable and more flexible. This could undermine family life as traditional roles are not followed as closely in today’s society.
Smart - connectedness thesis
Smart proposes an alternative thesis
· Instead of seeing us as disembedded and with limitless choice, Smart argues we are social beings whose choices
are made ‘within a web of connectedness’
According to this view, we live in networks of existing relationships and interwoven personal histories, and these strongly influence our range of options and choices in relationships
For example, Finch and Mason (1993) in their study of extended families found that although people can negotiate relationships to some extent, they are embedded within obligations that restrict choice
This challenges the assumption of ‘pure’ relationships
Stacey
Stacey (1998) argues that changes in the position of
women have increased the diversity of family types.
Stacey’s research found that women have been the main agents of change in the family. Many of the women she interviewed rejected the traditional stay-at-home role and instead created new types of family that better suited
their choice to work, return to education, divorce and re-marry.
One of these new family types Stacey calls the ‘divorce-extended’ family whose members are connected by divorce rather than marriage. The key members are normally female and may include former in-laws such as
ex-mother and daughter in-laws.
Such families illustrate the idea that postmodern families are diverse and that their shape depends on the active choices people make about how to live their lives – for example, whether to divorce, cohabit, come-out as gay etc.
Thus, as Morgan (2011) argues, it is pointless trying to make generalisations about ‘the family’. Family is
whatever an individual chooses to call their family
