Outline and assess functionalist and new right views on the family This essay aims to explore the views of the functionalist and new rights approach on the family. Functionalists argue that the family is the most important institution in society as it benefits both the individual and society. They have the most positive view on the family, and state that it performs vital functions for the maintenance of society. Their main emphasis is on the nuclear family which is the stereotypical family of married, heterosexual parents with children - they tend to ignore any other family types. The approach presents the family as a family isolated from wider kinships because of the mobility required by labour markets in industrial societies.
Furthermore, Breen and Cooke (2004) suggest the variation in the gendered division of domestic labour by identifying three types of women and three types of men.Post-modernists reject the idea that family life in modern industrial societies is still patriarchal as there are generalisations and over-exaggerations made at the extent of men's power over women in society. Since the 1950s, women now play an important role in the labour market, and the change from manufacturing to service economies have prompted more women to enter paid employment. The increase in the number of self-employed and part-time employed women suggest that the dual employment of families have begun to transfer breadwinner and decision-making power to women, especially when the woman earns a higher income bracket than that of her husband.From a post-modernist perspective, the feminist approach to the patriarchy present in society is not sensitive to the difference between families. Bernades states that "the modernist view of the family is essentially a popular image of the nuclear family. Heterosexual couples, with a small number of healthy children, living in an adequate home," implying that feminism is arguing against an outdated model that does not take into account the great diversity that exists between family relationships in
Another example is the shifting social attitudes which mean that it is more accepted in society for men to do housework. Young and Wilmot’s give a few other reasons for a symmetrical family. One example is that families are becoming privatised- this means that families are more children cantered and spend more time at home. This privatisation has occurs because the families are more affluent- have more money- and due to geographical mobility- they have less help from nearby family members. On the other hand, another group of sociologists believes that families are not symmetrical.
High income careers, management careers, political careers and engineering carriers are considered just for men. Home chores are clearly for women. It’s not expected from a man to do jobs like cooking, cleaning the house , care child in home or babysitting jobs although this pattern have been changed a little in recent years due to social and economic changes. Although based on traditional gender roles some fields like nursing are highly feminine this pattern not only change but also this change effects on other fields like gender roles in work area. The number of highly educated women in management, engineering, journalism and social science increased in recent years and this change are changing all former social structure related to gender roles.
From 1950's living and working in the uk we see that a male follows a patriarchal role and goes out to work while the wife stays at home and cooks and cleans as well as dealing with childcare waiting for the father to come home to provide emotional support and comfort from the strains of working life.Now in the modern day we see changes in conjugal roles in the family and now both parents may usually work and share jobs within the household.Wilmot and Young suported conjugal roles and that at the time of writing in 1970 that housework and leisure time were both shared as opposed to 1950s nuclear families where jobs and chores may have only been done by the wife in the household. Reconstituted families has increased in Britain significantly 1 in 10 children live with one birth parent and one step parent as well as over half the children in reconstituted families have a positive view of there divided lives Haskey 1994. This shows a big increase in family diversity and reconstituted families have an overall positive view, after all reconstituted families can provide emotional and financial support similar to the warm bath theory by parsons, and can help to provide a loving family to then
Jack Volpe Mrs. Mason Pop Culture Gender Role Essay As the Women’s Rights Movement began to increase in popularity in the mid to late twentieth century, America began to see a shift in how popular culture began to portray the father figure of the family. In earlier shows such as Leave it to Beaver, Father Knows Best, and Married with Children the father of the family is shown to be caring, hardworking, and a benefit to have in society. As Women began to take a more active role in society during the Women’s Rights movement, men began to be portrayed differently than they did before. Now shows like Modern Family, Family Guy, and the Simpsons portray fathers as being extremely unintelligent, arrogant, and idiotic. In the 1950’s TV
Women and men appear to be selectively investing unpaid work time in the tasks that construct family life while spending less time in routine tasks, suggesting that the symbolic meaning of unpaid work may be shifting. At the same time, access to free time has emerged as an arena of time inequality. Economic, demographic and normative shifts all point in the direction of more similar time allocation patterns for men and women today as compared to 40 years ago. The widespread entry of women into market work since the 1960s has challenged the presumption that women’s primary adult role is that of caretaker for the home and family (Shelton and John 1996). Concurrently, the erosion of wages for men over the past 25 years has challenged the ability of men to be the sole family breadwinner (Levy 1995).
Men are socialised into exploitative relationships in relation to work and they carry this socialisation over into the home and their relationship to women. b. Patriarchy is an ideology (a set of related beliefs about the world - in this instance, male - female relationships) that stems from male attempts to justify the economic exploitation of women. c. The "family system" characteristic of modern societies benefits capitalism (and, by extension, the men who tend to dominate positions of power and influence) because women: - can be forced / socialised into unpaid domestic labour. - can be forced / socialised into responsibility for child-rearing. This benefits the Capitalist because they do not have to pay women to perform this role (the "reproduction of labour power" in society).
The diversity of families has increased over these following years, due to the changes in society and values. New right hold the view that the there is only one correct or normal family type which is the nuclear family. Conservative government which traditionally follows the new right traditions support the nuclear family. Same as functionalist who have similar views ; parsons 1995 still recognise that there are a number of diversity families rising, nevertheless, functionalists 2000 argues that these changes are exaggerated and still sees the cereal packet nuclear family as the norm. Whereas on the other hand, feminist see the nuclear family still as the norm as they live under an oppressed government who follow the traditions of the new right where they believe in the nuclear family as the norm.
The stabilisation of adult personalities – the family offers adults the emotional support to cope with the everyday stresses of life. Parsons also stated that there were four changes to the family that industrialisation borught, which include; geographical mobility – nuclear family move to different parts of the country as they aren’t as attached to other family relatives than the extended family. Isolated nuclear family- as the nuclear family were geographically mobile they felt isolated. Structural differentiation – this is where the nuclear family became a unit of consumption, instead of a unit of production. Husband & wife roles – the male was the ‘instrumental leader’.