Social scientists' challenges to traditional definitions of the UK family

¶ … Family

Traditional definition

Limits families to a heterosexual union with children

Does not account for other family types

Does not accept gay unions

Is highly positivist in data analysis and collection

The traditional family defintion focuses on the family with a heterosexual orientation. This defintion is functional in orientation and highly conservation in terms of its approaches to family. Consequently, other forms of family are not recognized or accepted as legitimate forms of family. This posture means that these families are not families. Single parents, extended families, and other non-traditional models are not entertained. Additionally, this approach is highly positivist in orientation and depends heavily on the creation of categories of families and the use of statistical data. The analysis attempts to understand trends based on the mean and departures from that mean. This is a major limitation since the nuanced nature of family requires that different types of data be collected which flesh out meaning and give understanding to the experience of the members of the family.

Contribution of Sociology

Initial critique of the definition by Coontz (1992)

This type of family is very limited and fails to account for much of the world.

Conflict theorist defined family using conflict of interest in the family and power relations.

The feminist critique

Coontz (1992) challenges the initial proposition that the traditional ideal family ever existed at all. This family defined as a married heterosexual couple raising their children, has functioned as a dominant cultural norm

. From the beginning, sociologists questioned the accuracy of this construction, and have subsequently identified alternate views that give greater latitude to the concept of family.

The consideration of power and inequality drive the conflict perspective and as a result, power relations are important. Family relations are therefore used to maintain the power inequalities in society (Coontz, 2000 p.286)

From the conflict view point families in the UK are shaped by capitalist conceptions and the need to maintain a surplus reserve of labor. The family forms therefore change when the demands of the capitalist system change.

Feminist critique-They call into question the validity of the patriarchal system, which gives men more privilege and power than women do. Feminist understand the family as an oppressive institution, which should be dismantled or reformulated at the very least (Thompson & Walker, 1995 p.850).

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Contribution of Anthropology

Rejection of the need to produce a single universal definition of family

Identification of other societies where other family forms dominated

Use of a different methodology that was focused on more qualitative elements.

Anthropologist, who provided accounts of other civilizations, where families were not as described by the heterosexual one-man one-woman definition, has provided a challenge to the concept of the ideal family.

Recently, the focus is on understanding the nuanced meanings people give to their lived experiences and cultural structures (Family in anthropology 2010).

Methodologically anthropologist have popularized the use of ethnography as a way to study families in modern societies. Ethnography focuses on the culture of people and have given balance to the male dominated numerical analysis of what occurs within the family.

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Contribution of Economics

Provided the conceptual tools for the assessment of the division of labor in the family.

Feminist critique gave great impetus to this dynamic

The most critical methodological change that has influenced the definition of family is the movement away from a Posivist quantitative approach to more qualitative approaches.

Additionally, this created a movement away from the search for categories of families to an attempt to understanding the experiences of families and how members of familes interpreted their lives.

This created a need to new research questions which could be adequately answered with words instead of numbers

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Conclusion

The traditional definition is very limited in focus and coverage of family types

The quantitative orientation of that definition was balanced by more qualitative work

Each discipline assisted in the reformulation of the definition by working in the areas of its strengths.