Chapter 1 Images Family in U S society is a symbol a visual image that speaks to us through the senses from our own remembered experiences o Family as haven Major themes love and protection Family acts as an escape from society o Family as fulfillment Provides love intimacy and trust Refuge from cold cruel world Victorian period Christopher Lasch named this image as haven in a heatless world and described it as a glorification of private life made necessary by the deprivations experienced in the public world The family was idealized as a repository of warmth and tenderness by the mother standing in opposition to the competivite and aggressive world of commerce by the father The family s task is to protect against the outside world After the 19th century the ideal family became a womblike inside to be defended against a corrupting outside A haven of primary fulfillment and meaningful experience Todays families compensate more so than protect It supplies what is vitally needed but missing in other social arrangements If work does not does not provide excitement individuals can turn to their family lives for personal fulfillment E g work life balance The image of family life today is on of intimacy spouse lovers and even children making feel alive and invigorated Todays ideal of intensive parenting large amounts of quality time spent on interacting with children is seen as both critical to childrens development and intrinsically fulfilling for parents The modern emphasis on self actualization and never ending change in adulthood places more value on being able to choose freely than on commitment Today we no longer speak of true love instead we speak of meaningful or alive because it involves honesty The essential qualities of modern family life self fulfillment enjoyment and rejuvenation may be constrasted with an older morality of duty respibsilit work and del denial Duty has been replaced with the obligation to enjoy family life The fun mortality expressed currently by the advertising industry glorifies the family united in pursuit of common activities that are enjoyed by all o Family as encumbrance A new and negative image The anti image of the family is new For the first time in U S history we blame the family for inhibiting our full human development o This calls for freedom from domestic relationships More time at work and less time at home This also views family s as inhibiting the quest for a full experience of self The restless self must be kept unfettered flexible and ready to change attachments must be broken when they no longer permit continual development Monogamous marriage can become boring and stultifying The family is to blame for inhibiting full human development The family limits access to spice and space o these are the qualities for which we yearn o Applying the images of the family to your own experiences In Class Activity Family as haven immediate family mother father siblings Family as fulfillment father Family as encumbrance mother Images and Realities o Popular cultural images no longer describe family life if they ever did The general public clings to romanticized images of the family Family is thought as a peaceful harbor a shelter in the storm o SNAF standard north American family sociologist Dorothy Smith calls the idealized family image this SNAF is an ideological code that distorts family reality and glorifies the two parent family model Leave it to beaver LITB men outside o These images are race and class specific this ignores the reality if family life in many sectors of the population social and economic forces make the ideal inaccessible to all yet the two parent family is the universally expected family form o the symbolic family shape that shape out thinking are misleading when they become standards against which we measure ourselves public policy it also guides internal evaluations of our own success and failure as a family members o We live in an information society filled with images and messages o Today s television families are more realistic than in the past but we are still held to an unrealistic image of family coming to us from every part of society When our real families don t measure up we can feel ashamed and guilty and even angry that our families aren t ideal Modern family Most popular shows revolving around families Family is an impossibly overloaded guilt creating insitution Myths of the US Family o Myth a belief one holds that has not been examined or proven Myth 1 parents in the past were stable Marriage today is not better or worse its just different Myth 2 family life and the outside world are separate entities Families protects us from society and also prepares us for society Families shape themselves around social institutions Myth 3 the myth of the monolithic family Who you identify as your family may be different than your family of origin Myth 4 the family is a unified entity Gender system and age system produce different realities for men and women as well as for child and adults Age and gender often produce different conflicting interest among family members Example off and running clip o Lesbian couples who are white Jewish and adopted 3 children who are African American biracial and Asian American Myth 5 the myth of the family consensus Families may provide emotional support and nurturance but it may also inspire violence and brutality Myth 6 the decline of the family is the cause of the nations social problems The clash of the two parent family vs everything else Is the family s influence on society uni or bi directional o From an ecosystem framework the family is stated within a larger context in which laws the economy etc influences the family How important is family structure Chapter 3 Family Diversity A Historical View o Historical perspectives on minority families Only 7 of families fit into the idea of a standard family mom stay at home dad bread winner Racial minority families who don t meet the standard family ideal are viewed as deviant The African American family in particular has been stereotypes as disorganized and equated with family problems what families should not be Matriarchal families a form in which the power rested in the mother figure with fathers who are largely absent from family life the mistaken idea that slavery weakened kin ties and undermined family values gave way to notions of the matriarchal family New research investigates how families are connect with larger social and economic