Social Institutions:
The Family
Chapter
14: Sociology, Schaefer, 1995-2012
See
also, Michael Kerl's MARRIAGE
& FAMILY PROCESSES
The
typical American family?
(Or, this?)
The Crisis
of Change
- Pre-marital sex
- One in four births-unmarried
mothers (1 in 10 1970)
- ~50% of all children
will spend some time in a single parent family (85% African-American).
1995: 21% of White families, 36% of Hispanic families, 64% of Black
families)
- ~25% of pregnancies --abortions
- Increasing rates of unmarried
couples (up 6x in the 1960s, up 6x 1970-1991; number of couples doubled
from 1980-1993, rate have double for those over age of 50)
- Divorce
rate (calculate current
(2009) rate=divorces per 1000/marriages 1000)
- Increasing number of
people remaining single
longer (1 in 4 households). Still fewer than 10% never marry. Age
at marriage (and "cougars") (local
copy) (NY
Times article: 10/15/09)(see
also) (Who
marries when?)(Knot Yet: Benefits and Costs of Delayed Marriage)
- Growing number of "childless"
(child-free?) couples (follow-up).
20% of women in their 30s state that they will never have children.
Married couples without children. (over 50% of married couples are couples
without children at home, 1990) (nearly 20%
of American women--no children at 44--up from 10% in 1970)
- Multigenerational
Families (full
report)
- Test tube babies
- Working mothers
- Inter-racial
Marriages? (Marrying
Out) (map,
2008)(Who
is marrying whom? NYTimes, 2011)(The Rise of Intermarriage, Pew Social and Demographic Trends, 2/16/2012)
- Gay
Marriages? (children
with same-sex parents)(see also)(2010-6 states allow same-sex marriage. 41 prohibit)
- Networked
Families (full
report, local copy)
- Decline
of Marriage and Rise of New Families (full
report, local
copy)
- 2011: 39% of Americans agree that marriage is becoming obsolete.
What is a
Family?
Number of Partners
Emotional and Economic
Support
Mobility and Independence
Authority Patterns
Descent
and Inheritance
Determining Kinship
- Patrilineal
- Matrilineal
- Bilateral
Form
Looking
Theoretically at the Family
- Dominance of men over
women-Engels: first class antagonism (2005: 1 stay-at-home dad for every 38 stay-at-home moms)
- Women as property
- Social Conflict: Violence
as a norm, stress, lack of community, sexism, intergenerational transmission.
No single theory is adequate to explain complex dynamic.
- Domestic
Violence (Gelles
on "Family
Violence")
- Spouse abuse
- Child abuse
- Parent abuse
- Sibling Abuse
- Murder
Interactionism
- Self-fulfillment and
self-definition
- The Dyad
- Authority versus intimacy:
communication between family members
- Social exchange: marriage
and courtship negotiations, changing levels of assessment: Females- from physical
attractiveness to financial resources (see: Macionis, "Sociology"
6th edition, 1997; and Blau, "Exchange and Power in Social Life,"
1964)
- Variation in interaction in the family--two-parent/single parent/step-parents.
- Networked
Families (full
report, local copy)
- Multigenerational
Families (full
report)
Trends, Patterns
and Evolving Forms
Parenting and grandparents
- Critical job, no qualifications.
Problem of anticipatory socialization. Consensus on child rearing (Corporal
punishment).
- Extension of parenthood--adult
children coming home
- Living longer--More
Grandparents
- Children raised
by grandparents
(10% in 2010)(full report)
- Types:
- Recreational care
givers
- Symbolic (geographical
separation)
- Active-everyday
- Divorce and custodial
care
Adoption
Dual
career families ($48,169 vs. $30,075)
Class
variations
- Tradition vs survival
- Authoritative vs Authoritarian
- Growing homogenization
Racial
and ethnic variations
Divorce
- Trends
- rate 1992: 51.4%,
rate of remarriage-70% of those under 35, 50% within 3 years
- 2008: "50-State
Tour" (49.3%)
- Stations: emotional,
legal, economic, coparental, community, psychic
- Stages
of Divorce
- Factors predicting a
higher probability of Divorce:
- Young age
- Short acquaintance
- Short engagement
- Parental and friend
disapproval
- Dissimilar backgrounds
- Low level of education
- Conflicting role
expectations
- Urban.
- Inheriting
Divorce.
Cohabitation:
- Tremendous increases
- Mead--individual marriage
and parental marriage.
- Practice marriage?
Singlehood:
- High age of first marriage
- Many remaining single
7-10%
- Choice
and reality
- Freedom, excitement,
career.
Gay
families:
Child
free marriages
Single-parent
families
Networked
Families (full
report, local copy)
- Industrialization and
the Transformation of the Household: Gender roles. family as unit of
consumption vs. unit of production. Work outside of the home.
- Shift from family responsibility
to External responsibility: Rise of other Institutions. Income levels
for families with children have declined, DINKs, Government Bureaucracy,
Costs of education, After-school and Summer programs, decline of parental
authority, shift in locus of socialization
- Schools and Community
(schools as "constructed" institutions, schools as unable to fulfill
all the demands of the socialization process).
- Schools provide: opportunities,
demands, and rewards. Families/communities provide attitudes, efforts, and
conceptions of self.
- Social Capital
versus Individual Capital.
- Recent
study by the Center on Education Policy (2007) suggests type of school,
private vs. public, has little effect on student success
Back to
the lecture
Back
to Conflict Theory
URL: http://www.umsl.edu/~keelr/010/family.html
Owner: Robert O. Keel rok@umsl.edu
References and
Credits for this Page of Notes
Last Updated:
Tuesday, April 9, 2013 8:26
