Functionalists have always seen the family as a very harmonious relationship but Cheal (2002) notes that functional relationships can easily turn into dysfunctional relationships and that love can often turn to hate within a matter of days. Cheal also notes “we have to face the paradox that families are contexts of love but also contexts of violence and anger and that we have to work around this to make family as functional as possible for everyone.
Marxism in relation to the family-
Sees the family as NEGATIVE for society
Marxists are critical of the family and society. They believe society is based on a conflict between the classes – working class and ruling class. The family helps to maintain class differences in society as the rich can afford to give their children a better start in life than the poor, e.g. pay for a better education, and get them a good job either in their own business or their friends businesses. Marxists believe the family socialises the working class to accept that it is fair that the classes are unequal.
Feminism in relation to the family-
See the family as NEGATIVE for society.
Feminists believe the family is bad for women. Girls and boys learn their different gender roles within the family through socialisation. Girls copy their mothers, doing housework, whilst boys copy their fathers, doing DIY. They then learn that this is how male and female roles should be. Feminists believe that the family is male dominated – the term for this is patriarchal.
New Right in relation to the family-
See the family as NEGATIVE for society if it is not a nuclear family.
They have similar views to Functionalists. They believe that the nuclear family is very important to society. They say that children from nuclear families:
- Do better at school
- Get better jobs
- Do not turn to crime
The New Right believe that Single parents and same sex couples are bad for society.
Interactionism in relation to the family-
- Interactionists look at society on a MICRO scale [this means that they look at society on a small scale]. They do not want to generalise their ideas to the whole of society.
- Interactionists study how people behave in small scale situations. For example they would not look at what education does for the whole of society, but they would look at one class in a school and look at how the teachers and pupils treat each other. They would then look at how this affects exam results.
- Interactionists are interested in looking at how people interact with each other [i.e. how people behave with each other] in different situations, e.g. in school, at home and at work.
SOCIAL THEORY IN PRACTICE
A FAMILY FEUD
Social Conservative versus Postmodernist perspectives on family life
INTRODUCTION
Ideas have roots. They can be traced back - as it were, organically - to the seeds from which they have grown. So, theories of the family are rarely, if ever, just theories.
Of course, they are ideas about how human beings should organise their sexual relations and their domestic and household arrangements, and by whom children should be created and how they should be reared. But they are also ideas whose origins can be seen to be embedded in grander theoretical and philosophical arguments about:
- the relationship between the individual and society;
- the benefits and dangers of modernity;
- the nature of freedom and human fulfilment;
- and the route to the good life and social progress.
It is one of the basic arguments of this article that any real understanding of the debates about the family today can only be achieved by appreciating the theoretical and philosophical roots of these opposing positions. We need to start by looking at arguments about welfarism and the nuclear family.
TWO OPPOSED VIEWS
- On one side of the argument are SOCIAL CONSERVATIVES, who believe in both the virtues of nuclear family living and in the argument that the state should provide Welfarist support for this unit.
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On the other are INDIVIDUAL LIBERATIONISTS, or POSTMODERNISTS.
They see nuclear family living as just one more lifestyle choice and not a superior way of organising either sexual activity, adult relationships, or the biological and social reproduction of children. These thinkers are opposed to Welfarist support of the nuclear family, but are in favour of other forms of state support being made available to allow people to pursue their own route to individual fulfilment.
POSTMODERNISM AND FAMILY LIVES: FREEDOM
FROM THE TRUTH MERCHANTS
In the 1970s, a new form of social theorising emerged, strongly influenced by developments in French philosophy, which argues for the centrality of language and discourse in social life. While, like all living things, humans experience reality via their senses, they alone can know what these experiences mean. This is because they have systems of knowledge - such as languages - which provide them with these meanings. However, though uniquely empowered in this way, there is a sting in the tail, for no human has any choice about the meanings contained in the language he or she learns. Thus, it is an array of pre-existing languages which determines our knowledge for us.
Although we are empowered to be human because of languages, paradoxically, we have no control over which knowledges we learn.
For those in this tradition, most notably Michel Foucault (1926 - 1984), all knowledge systems - which he calls discourses - work like languages. Thus we 'know' mad people are ill and not, for example, bewitched, because medical knowledge tells us. We 'know' unmarried women shouldn't really be mothers but, once married, we 'know' they should be mothers. Such 'knowledge', however, is a cultural feature, which has emerged, historically, just as ordinary languages have done. Therefore, just as we'd be pretty stupid to claim that one of the languages we have learnt - say French - is 'better', or more accurate, or 'truer' than another, - say Spanish - so we should realise that other forms of knowledge from our own are not better or worse - or more accurate at depicting reality - but just different ways of knowing.
Our ways of defining our world, are no nearer 'The Truth' than any others. Thus, those subjected to other discourses in other cultures 'know' different truths. For example, the members of some cultures 'know' marriages should be arranged for economic and political reasons rather than because of romantic attachment; members of some cultures 'know' that young girls should be circumcised or 'protected' to ensure their chastity before marriage; while the members of some cultures 'know' that polygyny - a husband with more than one wife - or polyandry - a wife with more than one husband - is the 'right' arrangement for married men and women.
