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Sociology of the Family

In: Social Issues

Submitted By sean44
Words 3558
Pages 15
“It is no longer possible to pronounce in some binding way what family, marriage, parenthood, sexuality or love mean, what they should or could be; rather these vary in substance, norms and morality from individual to individual and from relationship to relationship.” (Beck, U and Beck-Gernsheim, E. 1995:p5). Through history there has been a varied view on the family, with changes in the functions, roles and relationships within the family being widely debated. There has been a major development with the types of family that exist in Britain today, with influences from the widening ethnicity of Britain it has adapted to many different cultures.
Functionalism is considered the consensus view of the family. They see the family as a vital organ and the cornerstone of society. George Peter Murdock conducted a study entitled “social structure” (1949), in which he studied 250 societies both small and large. He claimed the findings of this was that some sort of family existed in every society which means the family is universal. (Haralambos, Holborn. 2008). According to Murdock the family is an institution which fulfils the functions essential for a harmonious society. He believed the family provided a stable environment hence strengthening the emotional bond between parents and children. Murdock believed that the family performed four essential functions sexual, reproductive, economic and educational. (Taylor. 1995).
However Talcott Parson suggested that the family lost most of its main functions through industrialisation. He believed that through industrialisation the agrarian extended family was replaced by the ‘nuclear family’ to best fit the needs of society. The family was no longer a unit of production but a unit of consumption. The family functions such as education, care of children and elderly, care of the sick, had all been taken over by hospitals,

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