Essay On Feminist Approaches To Family Studies

The emphasis on individualism has provoked a deeper inspection of one’s personal values and beliefs while feminism has opened the door for a new type of traditional family to emerge with new dynamics between parents, children and their roles within the home. These new dynamics merge right along with cultural values as the two merge. In America, life is varied from home to home with different culturally-influenced family values. While throughout other parts of the world, different countries have maintained a balance within a core value system that affects all families alike through religion and a national way of life. There is no doubt that the many varied factors of modern society, ethnic background and religion all play significant roles in forming family values that shape the life of an

During life, birth, and death, a family is one of the few natures of life that are present throughout. Often times, the value of family is taken for granted, and people tend to disregard the importance it carries. Due to the power present in the nature of a man, often times it is challenging for women to establish a firm independence, in distinction of the common norms inaugurated in society and in family. In both A Thousand Splendid Suns and Pride and Prejudice, men are the dominant figures in all households, as they have control over their financial status, who their children marry, where they live, and create means in which the females of the family must follow. The inferiority that women face leads to an inquiry of an immense pride

It is commonly taught in textbooks or shown in the media that colonial mothers are always taking part in childcare, but in reality the “modern working women” (1) spends more time taking care of their children. During the hours that modern women are not working, they are usually taking care of the children and doing household work to manage the household, in which the “traditional family” seems more fitting in categorizing the modern family, rather than the colonial family. The colonial women did not have to worry about taking care of the children, because they usually gave the task of caring for the children to the servants or older siblings. Moreover, the traditional family are usually perceived as a family where the husband and wife are role models of a loving, caring, and supportive relationship for their children. This leads the children to act in the same positive way with others by observing the relationship between their parents. Interestingly, the “traditional” families in the past were not traditional, as women and children were advised to be obedient to their husbands, otherwise they would be abused and

Contributions of Feminist Sociologists to the Study of Family Life What Is Feminism? "In my heart, I think a woman has two choices: either she's a feminist or a masochist. " - Gloria Steinem There are three types of feminism - Marxist, Radical and Liberal. All feminists believe in gender socialization, although they all blame different groups of people for women being treated the way they do.

It is in the traditional values of family integrity that there are stereotypical views on families of all kinds: single parents, divorced families, families without children, families same sex. Homosexuality, heterosexuality and transgenderism are highly pressured in aspects related to heterosexual marriage such as marriage, childbirth, and the resulting pressures on kinship. At the beginning of the piece.

Until quite recently, the traditional view of family that has predominated society has been comprised of gender roles. The “ideal” family in the past has consisted of a white, middle-class, heterosexual couple with about 2.5 children. In this heteronormative nuclear family, the father is the head of the household and the breadwinner of the family, while the mother is the one who cares for the children and completes household duties. Of course, most families do not fit into this mould and those who do not fit have been repeatedly marginalized due to their differences. It is no question that race, class, sexuality, ability, and many other identity markers intersect in how forms of family may vary. As explained by the concept of intersectionality, gender must be analyzed through a lens that includes various identity markers which contribute to how an individual experiences oppression. It is through the use of intersectionality, the discussion of patriarchy, and the deconstruction of “family” that bell hooks (1990) and Michelle K. Owen (2001) paint family as a site of belonging and contestation.

Everyone has a family of some kind. It may be the parents and siblings they were born with, or it could be the gang of six biologically unrelated elite drivers with an affinity for robbing banks at high speeds from Fast and the Furious. Ultimately, family is what people make of it, and it can be the ‘traditional’ two parents, one brother, one sister, and a dog named Spot, or it could be a woman and the kid she was left with. The term ‘traditional family' refers to the socially expected behaviors of each given role (for example, a mother taking her kid to the doctor,) in the family. Members of a traditional family in this case are either maritally or biologically related. Barbara Kingsolver’s The Bean Trees has many characters who would consider themselves, or be considered, part of different families. The Bean Trees addresses and deals with the fact that nontraditional families can be just as strong as what society has defined as a ‘traditional’ family.

As someone who did not grow up with a typical family, I claim most of my close friends as “family” members. Every year we get together for birthdays, vacations and celebrate some holidays together. Some of my close friends are even closer than my actual family. One friend that I grew up with since the 7th grade is practically a brother to me, and even though I have and love my own mom, to this day I call his mother “mom” as well. I do believe that family is based on bonds and emotional ties, not just by blood and marriage. Our textbook defines “fictive kin as close relations with people we consider ‘like family’ but who are not related to us by blood or marriage (p.352)”. This sociological concept helps me realize that my own situation of who and what I consider family is more common than I may have thought before.

The Radical Feminist View of the Family Feminism is the belief that women are unfairly treated in society and it should be changed in order to create equality with men. However not all feminists believe the same and there ideas vary. Radical Feminists believe that it has been built into the way society is structured that men are allowed to exploit and oppress women. They call this patriarchy. They believe that abuse in the family is down to men being psychologically warped by centuries of patriarchy into being unable to accept women as equals.

Feminism is a body of social theory and political movement primarily based on and motivated by the experiences of women. While generally providing a critique of social relations, many proponents of feminism also focus on analyzing gender inequality and the promotion of women's rights, interests, and issues.

Societal perceptions of motherhood in North America have changed drastically over the last century and continue to change. Due to prescribed traditional gender roles, the concept of motherhood has historically been latent in the concept womanhood, in that a woman’s ability to reproduce was seen to be an inherent part of her identity. Thus there existed societal pressures not only for women to become mothers, but to fit into the impossible standard of being the “perfect mother”. However, as the feminist movement gained more ground and women were increasingly incorporated into the workforce, these traditional views of gender roles and in turn motherhood were challenged. As the family dynamics that exist today are much more diverse, what

The definition of feminism is very elusive. Maybe because of its ever-changing historical meaning, it’s not for certain whether there is any coherence to the term feminism or if there is a definition that will live up to the movement’s variety of adherents and ideas. In the book “No Turning Back,” author Estelle Freedman gives an accurate four-part definition of the very active movement: “Feminism is a belief that women and men are inherently part of equal worth. Because most societies privilege men as a group, social movements are necessary to achieve equality between women and men, with the understanding that gender always intersects with other social hierarchies” (Freedman 7).

For most of us, the family is considered as a well-known and comfortable institution. The perfect model of the ‘ideal’ family is still mostly considered to be consisted from two different sexes’ parents, and one or more children. Until quite recently, the sociology of the family was mostly functionalist and just in the last few decades has been challenged from various directions.

Annette Bair and Marilyn Friedman have opposing views on whether women have distinct moral perspectives. Like Friedman, I believe that women have no different moral perspectives than men. Some people, like Bair, think that women base their moral perspectives on merely trust and love and men base theirs on justice. Friedman points out that care and justice coincide . People use justice to decide what is appropriate in caring relationships and care is brought into account when determining what is just. Since these two moral perspectives correspond, gender does not distinguish different moral perspectives.

Family is one of the hardest words to define. There are many definitions and thoughts of what a family consists of. When one accepts the definition of the census family given by Statistics Canada then a family becomes “a married couple and the children, if any… a couple living common law and the children, if any… a lone parent with at least one child living in the same dwelling… grandchild living with grandparents but no parents present… Census families can be opposite or same sex and children may be adopted, by birth, or marriage and all members must be living in the same dwelling” (Baker 2014). With family being such a difficult term to agree on, the creation of a complex study of family life emerges. The factors that influence family life are put into three theory categories; Social Structure, Interpersonal Factors, as well as Ideas, Global Culture, and Public Discourse.