Family Formation and Change Over Two Centuries

Introduction

The idea of the "traditional" family of the 1950s is rooted more in nostalgia than in actual fact, according to Goode (1983) as quoted in Zinn, Eitzen, and Wells (2016). However, while the image of the happy, loving 1950s family may be a fiction, the concept of the nuclear family is one that certainly has some roots throughout the centuries. Though family arrangements and situations have differed greatly from society to society and from era to era, the nucleus of the family has generally consisted of a father, mother, and child — though how long it remained intact depended on a number of external and internal factors. These could range from the impact of disease to one's own internal frustration with family life, leading to estrangement.

Prior to the modern era, family dynamics and structures were far more normative and typical. The departure from the Old World, which began with the Reformation and Revolution of the 15th century onward, helped to establish a new process of family formation. This paper describes that process and shows how it has changed dramatically over the last two centuries.

From Courtship to Mate Selection

Today, the idea of courtship is about as foreign to young couples as the idea of learning classical Greek to read Homer in the original language. The concept of "courtship" has been replaced by the idea of "hooking up," which generally means satisfying one another's sexual urges for a time before moving on to "hook up" with someone else once the emotional satisfaction has faded (Hamilton and Armstrong 2019). As Demos (1986) indicates, sexual activity outside of marriage is not a modern invention — men and women have always engaged in this practice. The difference today is that it is far more publicly and socially accepted among the majority of society, even if some generations may still regard it as taboo (Zinn et al. 2016). Hamilton and Armstrong (2019) show that especially among younger generations there is more acceptance of, and even expectation to, "hook up" — and to do so means, to some extent, experimenting with sex and sexuality.

Yet two centuries ago, "hooking up" would have been considered scandalous in polite society. The Puritans surely engaged in sexual affairs — but they did so in secret, while in public they maintained a veneer of piety and sanctity (Zinn et al. 2016). Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter is essentially a work of literature that condemns the hypocrisy of the early Puritans by focusing precisely on this point. Nonetheless, the fact remains that if people wanted to "hook up" two hundred years ago, it certainly was not discussed as though it were a norm or a socially accepted practice.

Courtship occurred primarily as a means of mate selection in earlier eras, when social rituals were far more common and normative. The rituals of the Old World — prior to the Reformation — were still very much a part of society even as it transitioned into the modern era, replacing the Age of Faith with the Age of Reason (wherein natural philosophy begot Romanticism, which begot Skepticism, which begot Absurdism and Postmodernism). As Coontz (2004) notes, marriage in prior centuries was as much about economic interest as familial interest: it was approached like business, with arranged marriages the norm in parts of the West at different periods leading up to the modern era. It was also romanticized and approached as something one does when one falls in love, as well as treated as a purely practical affair.

In the past century, however, marriage and mate selection changed dramatically as a result of the women's movement and liberation: "The extraordinary increase in the economic independence and legal equality of women has reshaped the social landscape of family life" (Coontz 2004:975). The independence that women gained from the domestic sphere primarily occurred in the second half of the 20th century — following World War II, when women were permitted to work outside the home to facilitate the war effort. When the men came home, there was a push among women to maintain their independence. This altered the way in which courtship and marriage intertwined.

Even child-rearing changed in the 20th century — the idea taking something of a backseat with the arrival of birth control, promoted as a way to prevent children from being the result of sexual relations. Skolnick (2011) points out that economic burdens, especially since the Great Recession, are making more and more families reconsider having children. As birth control has become more widely accepted in the West, family size has begun to shrink.

Gender plays a role in all this as well, because the term itself has changed over time. Gender used to be synonymous with sex — one's biological sex determined one's gender. Today it is more widely accepted that gender is a social construct, and so one may be born with a biological sex without that sex determining gender — one's sense of self, or social context, may determine gender according to contemporary gender studies frameworks. In the 19th century, gender expectations were standard: men worked in the public world and women worked in the domestic sphere. Men's work consisted of labor or intellectual pursuits; women's work consisted of nurturing children and maintaining the home. In the 20th century, that changed as quality of life improved and expectations about gender roles shifted. Women began to work in the public world and domestic duties were deemed less central as social respect became tied to participation in the workforce.

Today, the domestic life has largely disappeared except for "traditional" families that adhere to the cultural norms of the prior century, wherein a woman tends to the nurturing and caring aspects of domestic life while the man works to support the family. This arrangement still exists — but it is one type among many, and there is no uniformity across society. Societal and cultural norms have been fractured.

Dating continues in many forms as well. "Hooking up" is not the only method used today — it is just one of many. Cultural expectations play a role in family formation: among traditional or religious populations, cultural norms still hold that there is a romantic dimension to love and courtship and that men should provide. Lamont (2019:124) notes that this is especially the case in some social circles in the West today, where "culturally dominant heterosexual courtship conventions dictate that men ask for, plan, and pay for dates, initiate sex, confirm the exclusivity of the relationship, and propose marriage, while women react to these advances." In today's culture, some men still want to make the decisions, and some women still prefer to let the man take the lead.

Cultures and subcultures abound in which different norms prevail, and Lamont illustrates this when she examines the queer subculture and how in the LGBTQ+ community the term "butch" is no longer accepted by many members because it is a label they are actively resisting (Lamont 2019:130). In the 21st century, resisting norms and cultural expectations is itself part of the mating ritual, just as embracing norms and reinforcing traditional paradigms remains common. Society has undergone severe fragmentation since the start of the 20th century, and the two World Wars along with the advancement of technological progress have assisted in that fragmentation: multiculturalism has prevailed and "norms" are essentially more tribal than societal.

Conclusion

Gender roles have changed over the last two centuries and, as society has accepted these transformations, family formations have changed as well. The purpose of family formation, of marriage, of "hooking up," differs depending on one's group, environment, society, age, gender, or personal experience. "Hooking up" is somewhat experimental in its essence, while "marriage" is viewed as somewhat permanent — though with roughly half ending in divorce, even that sense of permanence has been altered. Children may or may not be part of the picture, which leads many to wonder what the purpose of family formation is and whether their views are in alignment with those of their partners. Understanding the need to define one's views is part of what goes into the concept of family formation.

References

Coontz, Stephanie. 2004. "The World Historical Transformation of Marriage." Journal of Marriage and Family 66:974–979.

Hamilton, Laura and Elizabeth Armstrong. 2019. Shifting the Center: Understanding Contemporary Families. Thousand Oaks.

Kim, Katherin. 2019. "Out of Sorts." In Shifting the Center: Understanding Contemporary Families. Thousand Oaks.

Lamont, Ellen. 2019. In Shifting the Center: Understanding Contemporary Families. Thousand Oaks.

Schulman, Polly. 2004. "Great Expectations." Psychology Today 37:32.

Skolnick, Arlene. 2011. "Middle Class Families in the Age of Insecurity." Family in Transition, 17th edition. Boston: Pearson.

Zinn, Maxine Baca, D. Stanley Eitzen, and Barbara Wells. 2016. Diversity in Families, Updated 10th edition. Boston: Pearson.