Outline the Main Afro-Caribbean Family Forms in the Caribbean and Discuss Two Explanations for High Matrifocality Among This Group.

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According to George Peter Murdock (2004), a family is a social group characterized by common residence, economic cooperation and reproduction. Murdock also stated that it includes adults of both sexes, at least two of whom maintain a socially approved sexual relationship and one or more children, owned or adopted of the sexually cohabiting adults. He also notes that this form of family is universal, that is, it is found in every society and it is the basic unit. However, it should also be noted that according to Christine Barrow, Caribbean family life has been uniquely shaped by an African cultural and ideological heritage, by the experience of slavery and colonialism, multi-racial and multicultural societies, and by the socio-economic context of migration, unemployment and poverty (“Children’s Rights’ Caribbean Realities”). Janet Brown (2002) further notes that anthropological studies of the family in the Caribbean undertaken between 1940 and 1960 generally described the Caribbean family as dysfunctional compared to European and North American nuclear family models. However she notes that later research conducted in the 1970’s and 80’s recognized that Caribbean family patterns had been largely consistent since the days of slavery and they were in fact functional in terms of child and family survival under the conditions of colonial and post colonial poverty and oppression. Caribbean families whose roots lie in the family structures of west Africa have been matrifocal in nature, (a result of the West African legacy as well as the structure and function of slavery), within societies characterized by patriarchal structures of government and economy such as found in the west Indian society, during slavery, the period of colonization and in the pre-independence and post independence periods (Janet Brown 2002). In light of the above, we can therefore entertain an

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