CIA 1

Methods of Social Research

FAMILY
Submitted to: Dr Kusum Lata
Submitted by: Sanjana Singh
20214249
Christ (Deemed to be University), Delhi NCR
 INTRODUCTION
A social institution known as the family brings people together to form caring communities that
look out for one another, including any offspring. Families have been around since at least the
dawn of written history, although they have evolved over time and still differ from region to
region today. The majority of individuals in contemporary, high-income cultures like the United
States think in terms of the nuclear family, which consists of one or two parents and their
offspring. However, in lower-income countries around the world, people frequently acknowledge
the extended family, including parents, children, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins who
frequently live nearby and function as a family unit. The social institution of the family is
examined by sociology from a variety of angles, but its three main theoretical tenets are
functionalism, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionism. Different viewpoints and
methodologies are used in these ideas to comprehend the family as a social institution. Our main
focus, however, will be on how the functionalist paradigm sees the family before we compare it
to an alternative feminist paradigm through a sociological lens.
For a sizable amount of time, scholars have been fascinated with the family as an integrated and
effective unit of society. The family possesses a wide range of traits, which has led to an increase
in the volume and depth of research. The family is a crucial unit of analysis for sociological
research because of the structural, functional, developmental, and integrative roles it plays in
civilizations all over the world. The family has changed over time as an institution as a result of
widespread and, in some cases, intense influences from both inside and outside of society. It has
occasionally modified over its year of existence as a crucial aspect of society to meet the
demands of people and society. As a result, different types of families exist in different parts of
the world, supporting social development and individual growth. In addition to the functions the
family performs on behalf of individuals, its crucial role in the operation of the greater social
system has long been acknowledged. A greater knowledge of families' existence, growth/decline,
from, roles, functions, and adaptations to the changing environment we live in today comes from
studies of families from a variety of situations, places, and perspectives. (Sooryamurthy, R
2012).
 FUNCTIONALISM: A DOMINANT PARADIGM
According to the structural-functional perspective, the family is the most significant social
organization unit. According to George Murdock (1949), families are found all across the world
because they carry out crucial societal functions. Thus, a functional interpretation of the family
emphasizes the ways in which the family functions as a social structure to enable society. As a
result, the family serves a number of crucial roles. First, by encouraging the birth of children to
parents who have publicly committed to one another, families are the means through which
society controls reproduction. Second, families give kids a secure and loving environment. The
family is the primary socialization unit in the majority of countries. Children are socialized from
birth with the assistance of their parents, siblings, and other family members if the family is
extended rather than nuclear. Thirdly, families are groups where spouses and other kin cooperate
economically. And finally, in a world that may be cruel and occasionally dangerous, family
members rely on one another for emotional support. According to structural-functional analysis,
families serve as the cornerstone of a healthy society because of how crucial these functions are.
If so, any danger to a family is likely to be classified as a social issue.
Societies, according to functionalists, are like human bodies. In order to stress the
interconnectedness and mutual dependence of the various institutions of society, the organic
analogy integrates the concepts of a system. They thus regard the family as evolving and meeting
societal requirements. They contend that most pre-industrial households had patriarchal extended
family structures, using the example of Irish families living in rural areas in the 1940s as
evidence. This typically meant that the landowner lived with and submitted to his adult sons and
their wives while dominating his wives and children. Functionalists contend that industrialization
led to the nuclear family’s development.
The idea that institutions in society, such as the family, will evolve is connected to the
evolutionary approach to societal development. The modern nuclear family, according to
functionalists, has evolved from earlier forms, and its structure is most beneficial to and fit for a
sophisticated industrial civilization. Thus, the universality of the family has been connected to
this. The postindustrial family provides hints as to what they can anticipate, and studies of pre-
industrial communities demonstrate the ‘savagery’ of the past. According to the functionalist
viewpoint, the nuclear family has evolved because it is best adapted to an industrial society, its
small scale facilitates easy social and geographic mobility, and it offers a haven for its members.
It fits the needs of an advanced industrial society, in the same way that larger extended families
fitted the needs of an agricultural society.
Parsons is credited with making a significant contribution to functionalist family theories in the
20th century. His work has also been connected to the idea that the roles of the family have
changed as industry has advanced, in addition to the march of progress and evolutionary theories.
In Parsons 1902-1979, the family is presented in a favorable light. With a focus on the
advantages of the classic nuclear family of married parents rearing children, their viewpoints are
comparable to more current New Right ideologies. Other theoretical viewpoints on this family
type are more unfavorable. Simply put, Parsons gives us a modern, minimal family structure that
is suitable for developed modern industrial cultures. The family adapts and changes in step with
the advancement and industrialization of society. In the past there was great attention on the
economic and maintenance needs of family members. Agencies outside the family have taken on
responsibilities as societies industrialize and become more complex, with a growing division of
labor and specialization of jobs, a good example being the education of children. The economic
and maintenance responsibilities of the family have been replaced by welfare assistance for the
aged, the sick, and the unemployed (Haralambos, 2013).

ALTERNATIVE PARADIGM: A FEMINIST PERSPECTIVE

Since Mary Wollstonecraft (1792) published her Vindication of the Rights of Women, women
have advocated for equal rights with men. Other women took her place, with the Pankhurst
sisters and the suffragettes, who battled for women’s right to vote, being the most well-known.
Second wave feminism, which emerged in the 1960s with the writings of American author Betty
Frieden (1965), is a term used to describe this movement.
Varied forms of feminism, such as liberal, radical, and Marxist, have different perspectives on
the family and how this social structure functions. For instance, liberal feminists claim that
families have always been a blatant source of gender inequality. They think that changing the
current rules will lead to a “march of progress” toward gender equality at home and in larger
society. Radical feminists, on the other hand, do not think that amending the legislation would
ever be sufficient to abolish the tyranny and subjection of women. They contend that women will
always be oppressed by men, and that this oppression manifests itself within the family. In light
of this, women should seek out alternate means of habitation free from male dominance.
The experiences of women and children have been the main sociological focus on families since
the 1970s and 1980s. In addition, the spotlighting of these experiences has led to a growing
understanding that the family is an ideological construct that does not always serve everyone’s
needs. Feminists have emphasized that women have been the underrepresented sex in society for
millennia, and that this underrepresentation is largely due to their biology, or the fact that they
were born women as opposed to men. According to feminists, there is a disconnect between
women’s experiences as wives and mothers in a family and domesticity beliefs. Instead of being
innate, the gender roles that women have been given are built on the basis of this biological
difference. The home and the educational system serve as social construction and reinforcement
sites for gender roles. This is achieved by the various methods in which authority officials
interact with boys and girls, as well as the propensity for giving girls dolls and tea sets while
giving boys toy vehicles and construction toys (Firestone, 1970). However, according to Connell
(1987), this perspective frequently fails to take into account people’s freedom to accept or reject
the societal norms that are ingrained in gender roles. Connell contends that males and girls can
adopt traits from one another’s roles, such as the propensity of some girls to participate in
competitive sports and the practice of boys dressed in drag when they are by themselves.
According to Connell (1987), this may lead to both men and women creating a dream life that is
at odds with their outward behavior, suggesting that gender roles are interchangeable. Feminists
have also noted that novels that portray men and women in “traditional” roles encourage the idea
that men and women take separate pathways in life. These publications are part of a hidden
curriculum in the educational system. Girls were less likely than boys up until the late 1980s to
get the necessary number of A levels to enroll in college. Feminists have highlight this because
girls are now performing on par with or better than boys across the curriculum and more women
are pursuing higher education, the attention has recently tended to be on the growing
underachievement of boys. They are still at a disadvantage in the labour market compared to men
with the same degree of education, therefore this does not significantly improve their situation.
Women’s subordination grew as industrialization advanced and the public and private spheres
were divided, as has already been mentioned (Oakley 1981). The continued blurring of this
boundary over the second half of the 20th century has contributed significantly to the evolution of
the family. There are several factors behind the downfall of what was called traditional Family.
They link this imbalance to society’s patriarchal structure. According to Rich (1976), patriarchy
is a social and ideological structure in which men decide what roles women should and shouldn’t
have in society. The distribution of duties, both inside the home and in society at large, has been
mentioned by Oakley (1981) as a significant area of oppression for women. When children are
born, the father is typically expected to be the primary provider, which disadvantages women
because research has demonstrated a connection between wealth, power, and inequality. The
family, which has been regarded as the primary setting for socialization, serves as an effective
setting for social conditioning in which deference to authority creates the basis for the docile
workforce that capitalism demands. Gender disparities are socially manufactured, according to
Delphy (1977), and they typically serve the interests of the dominant groups in society. Delphy
further argues that as the categories of man and woman are not biological but rather political and
economic, women should be recognized as a different class. Therefore, women constitute a
group that men exploit, and the nuclear family is a prime example of this.
Marxist feminists claim that while capitalism’s exploitation may be explained by Marxism, this
does not explain the disparities between men and women. According to Delphy (1977), sexual
and gender inequality should be the central categories of feminist analysis. For instance,
Marxism alone cannot explain why women should be considered to be in charge of household
duties and why capitalism would still be profitable even if males stayed at home. Since many
women who have families nowadays also work outside the home, the Community Care Act of
1990 has increased the duties placed on women in the role of informal caretakers. This has a
significant negative impact on women’s health. It is therefore, seen that many government
policies, especially the concept of community care, are founded on antiquated ideas of the ideal
family, in which the majority of married women do not work outside the home, and that it is the
responsibility of women to fill the caring role. In these situations, even though a lot more women
now work than in the past, it is widely believed that the care that women do at home is a natural
element of women’s roles within the family.
 A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
One of a society’s most critical facets, according to the functionalists, is the family. They
consider the “nuclear family,” which consists of a working father who provides for the family,
and a stay-at-home woman who takes care of the household and the kids, to be the ideal.
According to functionalists, many modern families, such as those with same-sex parents and
single parents, are not ideal. Murdock believed that the family served four purposes: the enduring
fulfilment of the sex drive the continuation of the following generation the process of integrating
young people into society’s norms and values provide food and shelter in order to meet the
financial necessities of society. Marxism and functionalism are both macro theories, which
implies they focus on society as a whole rather than on specific societal segments. Functionalism
is a consensus theory, which means that its proponents believe that society is harmonious and
that everyone has a legitimate position in it. According to Cree (2000), “consensus approaches
begin with the premise that there is only one chosen, ideal family: the nuclear family” (p32).
Marxism, in contrast, is a conflict theory that recognizes the benefits that the family provides to
the state in general and the capitalist society in particular (Cree, 2000).
According to the Interpretive method, society is approached in a “dramaturgical” manner;
everyone has a predetermined role to perform and is expected to adhere to a specific script (Kidd
et al, 2003). According to Berger and Kellner (1964), the roles we pick up and assume within the
family are “ongoing constructs” (Kidd et al, 2003, p129).
According to Parsons (in Cree, 2000), the success of the nuclear family depends on the males
performing instrumental functions and the women performing expressive ones within the family.
Marxist viewpoints disagree with this assessment and believe that women are merely prostituting
themselves for their husbands’ incomes. They also believe that women serve as a “safety valve”
of emotional support for the “frustration that her husband suffers at work”, keeping the husband
from becoming enraged at the workplace and ensuring a productive workforce (Haralambos,
2013).
On the other hand, feminists have differing opinions about the family. Liberal feminists assert
that marriage is a patriarchal practice and that women should be valued for more than just being
homemakers who take care of the husband and kids. Some radical feminists even promote
political lesbianism, which is a rejection of misogynistic heterosexuality and is utterly
disregarded in functionalism. Political lesbianism is defined as being in a same-sex relationship
or partnership.
Since the 1950s, feminists have played a major role in criticizing the gender roles that are
connected to the traditional nuclear family. They contend that the nuclear family has historically
served two important roles that have ostracized women:
a) Socializing boys to believe they were superior while socializing girls to accept subservient
roles in the household; this is accomplished by having youngsters observe and then recreate the
parental relationship.
b) Socializing women to believe that the role of “housewife” is the only one available to and
appropriate for women. The only way to be feminine or a woman, in fact, was to do it. Feminists
essentially believed that the family’s role was to serve as a place where individuals absorbed
patriarchal ideals, which in turn helped to establish a patriarchal society.
This is something, which is completely different from what Functionalist would have focused on.
Thus, this shows the contrast that existed between the sociological approaches taken by two
different domains of interest.

References
Bograd, M. (1984). Family System Approaches to Wife Battering: A feminst critique.

Family Institution and Gender Equality:. (n.d.). TASHFIYAH.

Feminst Perspective of the Family. (2018, July). Retrieved from UKEssays:

https://www.ukessays.com/essays/sociology/feminist-perspective-family-7251.php

(1968). Functionalist View of the Family.

Merton, R. K. (2017). Intermarriage and the Social Structure.

Sooryamurthy, R. (2012). The Indian Family: Needs for a Revisit. Journal of Comparative Family Studies .

With reference to the family, consider how functionalist perspective enhances understanding of the
diversity of family in today's society. (n.d.). Retrieved from Marked By Teachers :
https://www.markedbyteachers.com/gcse/sociology/with-reference-to-the-family-consider-
how-functionalist-perspective-enhances-understanding-of-the-diversity-of-family-in-today-s-
society.html

Zeybek, Tijen & KASAP, Fevzi. (2020). Social Perspective for Family Functions in Society. Revista de
Cercetare si Interventie Sociala. 71. 305-324. 10.33788/rcis.71.19.

Cree,V.E. (2000) Sociology for Social Workers and Probation Officers. Oxon; Routledge

Haralambos and Holborn (2013) – Sociology Themes and Perspectives, Eighth Edition, Collins. ISBN-10:
0007597479

Kidd,W; Abbott, D. and Czerniawski, G. (2003) Sociology AS for AQA. London; Heinemann
Firestone, Shulamith, 1970, The Dialectics of Sex: The Case for Feminist Revolution, New York: William
Morrow.

Rich, Adrienne, 1976, Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and as Institution, New York: Norton.

Oakley, A. (1981), Interviewing Women: A contradictions in Terms In Roberts, H. (Ed). Doing Feminist
Research, London

Delphy, C. (1977) The Main Enemy: A Materialist Analysis of Women's Oppression

( 2011 , 12) .Functionalist, Marxist And Feminist Views Of The Family Researchomatic .Retrieved 12 ,
2011, from https://www.researchomatic.com/Functionalist-Marxist-And-Feminist-Views-Of-The-Family-
100454.html