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SOC2604 SUMMARIES FOR EXAM PREP
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SOC2604SUMMARIES
,SOCIOLOGY OF FAMILIES
AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS
, Part 1 – Sociology of Families
UNIT 1
Sociology of Families
The discussion in this study unit is mainly in line with Elliot s (1986) viewpoints.
1. DEFINITION OF FAMILY
Sociologists address the family as a social institution that is affected by social change and other
institutions in society such as the economy, polity, judiciary and religion.
In modern Western societies focus on the nuclear family as the family.
According to Elliot (1986:4), the nuclear family is widely thought of as a group based on marriage and
biological parenthood, as sharing a common residence and as united by ties of affection, obligations
of care and support and a sense of a common identity. This belief is questionable in a changing
society since it refers to the conventional idea of what sexual and parental relationships ought to be and
does not include different combinations of family members that lead to a diversity of family types
throughout the world, especially in South Africa with its diversified population.
These days families exist in many different forms and the conventional nuclear family that consists of two
parents who are married to each other and their biological children who live in the same house
is becoming proportionally less common. The family is still the institution that can best provide the
stable, patterned relationships that are necessary to care for and support family members in modern
societies.
In our developing South African society, family structures show great variation - even more so from
one culture to another. We have a problem in defining what really constitutes the family because it is
widely taken for granted that the family is regarded as a nuclear family and is the most dominant family
type in contemporary society. This belief is questionable in modern society where we find so many
different kinds of family structures or combinations of family members. The impact of this general
viewpoint causes other family structures to be regarded as unusual and even deviant (eg long-term
relationships, whether heterosexual or homosexual). To delimit the definition of the family to only
include the nuclear family is problematic, but a universally agreed definition is hard to find. How we
define the family determines the kinds of intimate relationships and living arrangements which we
consider normal or deviant, and what rights and obligations are seen as legally and socially binding).
The abovementioned restricting definition of the family in Western societies does not enable us to
deal with the range of characteristics associated with the modern African family or white families that
we find in South Africa nowadays. It does not make room for the diversity of family structures or
different combinations of family members. Different stages in the family life cycle are also not taken into
account by this limited definition (eg a family might start off as a nuclear family, progress to an extended
family, become a single- parent family and then become a reconstituted family with step-
relationships).
, In order to include all diversities and family structures and to resolve these definitional problems of the
family there are a variety of family structures and concludes that the family should be regarded as
what a particular social group believes it to be. This viewpoint does not exclude the diversity of family
arrangements like adoptive families; foster and gay-parent families; single-parents; and unmarried,
cohabiting parents. Policy-makers on the family have suggested that the term families be used
instead of the family to express and recognise the diversity of family structures and the inadequacy
of a restricted, delimited definition of the family. This approach regarding the definition of the family has
now changed among family sociologists and the old concept of the family has given way to a new
terminology of families in order to include all the different family structures.
2. DISTINCTION BETWEEN CONCEPTS
A household is regarded as a spatial concept where a group of people occupy the same house
or living space.
This means that the people who share the same living space may or may not be blood related
(eg people who live in a commune).
Families are generally regarded as groups of people who are bound together by blood and
marriage ties (and also by adoption) and who reside together.
There are two distinct categories: a spatial group and a kin (blood-related) group. According
to Elliot (1986:4), a family can form different households or more than one household (eg
when children leave home to go to school or university and then live in hostels with other
unrelated people or friends, or in communes).
a) Kinship and family
Kinship refers to a wide social network of individuals that is established by marriage,
common ancestry (blood ties) or origin (mothers, fathers, offspring, grandparents, uncles,
aunts).
The family (or families) is regarded as a variety of members who live together in a smaller
group and are either married, an adoptive family, a foster family, single-parents or
unmarried parents who function as a cooperative unit and take responsibility for the care of
children.
An extended family includes blood relatives from three or more generations, either from the
father or mother s side (patrilineal or matrilineal), who cooperate and live together. If they live
apart and do not pool their resources, they are seen as separate families and members
of a single kin group. Most people are members of two different family groups: the family
of orientation into which they are born and where early socialisation usually takes place and the
family of procreation which is established when somebody gets married and have (procreate)
children of their own or adopt children.
b) Marriage
Giddens describes marriage as a socially acknowledged and approved sexual union between two adult
individuals. When two people marry, they become kin to one another; the marriage bond also,
however, connects together a wider range of kinspeople. There are various forms of marriage.
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