The Nuclear Family is no Longer the American Ideal Essay

The ideal American family was transformed in the 19th century in large part due to the great changes taking place in the American society. Many family groups fit this changing mold while some did not. In this essay I will show how this concept of the ideal American family changed. I will also try to explain which groups of Americans followed this concept and why. The end of the 18th century was a turbulent time in American history. The country had just won its independence from Great Britain…

Traditional Family Modern Family New Family Models The Modern Nuclear Family THE MODERN NUCLEAR FAMILY The "nuclear", "isolated", or "restricted" family is not a recent phenomenon, but has existed in many cultures throughout human history. Indeed, the extended family of several generations is found mostly in relatively advanced, stable, and affluent, but not yet industrialized societies. Very primitive and very sophisticated societies seem to prefer the nuclear family model…

teaching life lessons to its viewers and most importantly representing the ideal nuclear family. Needless to say, we have come a long way from the white picket fence and 2.5 children as the model representation of an American family. Today, families are modeled in all different shapes and sizes. Two parent, single parent, multiple parents, or even extended family members can be seen raising the children. These families have developed over the past 60 years due to many reasons. The societal changes…

A blended family is when two people enter a marriage when they have children from a previous relationship. These families have been termed blended families because the two new spouses and the children are attempting to blend into one family unit. Blended families are commonly known as step families. Some other terms for blended families are reconstituted, restructured, and remarried families. Blended families are starting to become the most common type of family in the United States. It can be hard…

romanticized family institutions in North American is the nuclear family. Although the nuclear family was created to appear as the ‘traditional’ and normative ideal, it has never been the reality for all families (Kimmel & Holler, 2011, 154). The nuclear family was created after the end of the Second World War when women were taken out of the workforce and placed back into their homes. “Men and women embraced this nostalgia, marrying and having children early, and divorcing little. The 1950s family model…

Combining the multitude of factors that contribute to family formation and structure parallels to mixing ingredients to make a soup that does not always come out with the same taste, as even with the same contributing factors such as race, gender, and social, economic, and political pressure, one family can greatly differ from another. The ideology of the nuclear family shape clashed with my family’s more extended and traditional family structure, and upon arrival to the United States from Korea…

during the 1950s when the term “nuclear” was becoming more common in regards to the matter of families. The idea of that a nuclear family, a family consisting of a man, his wife, and their children under one roof, is the only type of family that should exist was often shoved into the faces of young Americans. The nuclear family had been around for centuries, only truly developing the title of “nuclear” in the early twentieth century. It’s the concept that any family that doesn’t fit the structure…

Depictions of families in the 1950s were extreme in a myriad of ways. The notion of a “nuclear family,” in which a husband, wife and their children were considered the smallest unit of our society, became incredibly popular. Husbands and wives each seemed to have particular roles and duties from which they couldn’t stray. The husband, of course, was a working man responsible for bringing money to the household. His wife worked on something else: their household itself. She cleaned, cooked, and decorated…

Today the idea of the nuclear family being normal has changed. It is now common to see the mixture of two families connected by a second or subsequent marriage, with one or both partners having children from prior relationships, thereby creating half siblings. Prior to the advent of no-fault divorce, most commonly the idea of blended families included a stepmother or stepfather and mother or father, and stepchildren, born to one of the parents in a previous marriage. The previous marriage had been…

Joint Family Vs. Nuclear Family System The joint family A joint family involves much more than people living under the same roof. Those of you who have experienced it will know its worth. With everyone putting in his or her part, the old joint family system could benefit everyone. Not only do your children get to live and grow with their grandparents and cousins, they also learn the value of relationship. They learn to give and take, to be patient, cooperative, tolerant and to adjust with the…