Key Concepts in Family Studies

Journal of Family Issues, 2019

The twin themes of 'family troubles', and 'troubling families', explored through this special issue, are closely linked, but they are also each distinct in themselves, and nuanced in particular ways, which we consider in this introductory discussion. We will also argue that these themes offer fertile ground for opening up new dialogue between contrasting bodies of work concerned with family lives and relationships. We are thus particularly delighted for the Journal of Family Issues to be hosting this special issue, since our twin themes are intended to cross (and indeed to question) such boundaries, and to encourage fresh perspectives as a result. The history and institutionalisation of family studies In what follows, we offer an account of family studies as siloed between a binary of 'the mainstream'-focused on what may be implicitly understood as 'ordinary' family lives-and 'the problematic'-focused on aspects of family lives that may be of interest to social policy experts, professionals and practitioners, and geared towards interventions of some sort. At the same time, we are conscious that these distinctions and contrasts are also perhaps understood in variable ways in different countries even within the affluent Minority worlds of Anglophone and Western European societies, let alone in Majority world countries. The account we offer here is primarily rooted in our UK based experience of family sociology on the one hand, and social policy and social work on the other. It has thus been our experience over many years that these are inclined to constitute distinct bodies of work, with limited dialogue between them either in publications or in conference venues, and, consequently, that this binary between the study of 'ordinary' and 'problematic' families is to some extent structurally embedded and institutionalised.

The Cambridge Handbook of Sociology

The Journal of Special Education, 2002

The British Journal of Sociology, 2012

The central concern of this paper is that there has been a move within British sociology to subsume (or sometimes, even replace) the concept of 'family' within ideas about personal life, intimacy and kinship. It calls attention to what will be lost sight of by this conceptual move: an understanding of the collective whole beyond the aggregation of individuals; the creation of lacunae that will be (partially) filled by other disciplines; and engagement with policy developments and professional practices that focus on 'family' as a core, institutionalized, idea. While repudiating the necessity (and indeed, pointing out the dangers) of providing any definitive answer to definitions of 'family', the paper calls for critical reflection on the implications of these conceptual moves.

Research Handbook on the Sociology of the Family, 2021

The Research Handbooks in Sociology series provides an up-to-date overview on the frontier developments in current sociological research fields. The series takes a theoretical, methodological and comparative perspective to the study of social phenomena. This includes different analytical approaches, competing theoretical views and methodological innovations leading to new insights in relevant sociological research areas. Each Research Handbook in this series provides timely, influential works of lasting significance. These volumes will be edited by one or more outstanding academics with a high international reputation in the respective research field, under the overall guidance of series editor Hans-Peter Blossfeld, Professor of Sociology at the University of Bamberg. The Research Handbooks feature a wide range of original contributions by well-known authors, carefully selected to ensure a thorough coverage of current research. The Research Handbooks will serve as vital reference guides for undergraduate students, doctoral students, postdoctorate students and research practitioners in sociology, aiming to expand current debates, and to discern the likely research agendas of the future.

Independent Journal of Management & Production

Family as a concept is flexible, thus prone to changes concerning the needs of the modern industrial society. Roles within the family are structured following the contemporary conditions, following the emancipation of women, reduction in the male workforce due to mechanization, and increased presence of grandparents as caregivers, due to increased life expectancy. The main objective of this scientific work is to analyse relevant standpoints regarding the function and sustainability of family, while taking into account external influences such as economic status, political situation, as well as societal norms and values. The identification of these challenges helps us determine the extent to which family structure and function is able to adopt to rapid globalisation that is taking place. Globalization is opening many doors, giving us freedom of choice in terms of family structure and roles, while simultaneously forcing us to find our identity through labeling ourselves as “this”, “th...

Sociology-the Journal of The British Sociological Association, 2004

Making Families: Moral Tales of Parenting and Step-Parenting Durham: sociologypress, 2003, 17.50 pbk (ISBN 1 903457 05 X) Over the last decade the family has become interesting to sociology again. Not only have issues of family and personal relationships been taken up by major social theorists, but this means that theorizing about intimacy and relationships has a kind of sociological street cred that was never the case in the days of Willmott and Young in the 1960s or even when the patriarchal family was the focus of serious feminist critique in the 1980s. Alongside this new vogue is a longer running, indeed almost interminable preoccupation, namely the debate over the decline of 'the' family and the demise of proper family values. The power of this debate has, arguably, tended to frame the agenda of a considerable amount of recent sociological work on family life. It has reached into the work of the theorists such as Bauman and who now produce images of the future of families as dystopian as any produced by the pro-family right. The debate has also shaped much empirical work because it frames such a dominating question that it continues to demand an answer. As tiresome as the question of whether 'the' family is in decline or not has become, it has led to a regeneration of interest and to a renewed intellectual investment in understanding family and kinship. It has also given impetus to research on emergent or diverse modes of intimacy that are not defined by 1043 Sociology

2011

Although the main outcome of the project is the European Research Agenda, none of the steps leading up to this-the summary of the major trends of families in the "Existential Fields" of family life, the critical review of existing research, and the 'future of families' exercise-would have been possible without the active participation of representatives of policy, scientific and social organisations from across

Public Affairs Quarterly , 2019

There are many different interpretations of what the family should be – its desired member composition, its primary purpose, and its cultural significance – and many different examples of what families actually look like across the globe. I examine the most paradigmatic conceptions of the family that are based upon the supposed primary purpose that the family serves for its members and for the state. I then suggest that we ought to reconceptualize how we understand and define the family in an effort to move away from these paradigmatic conceptions. This approach requires that we examine the way(s) in which the family has been defined descriptively – that is, how families have been defined historically – in an effort to determine what a normative theory of the family might look like. The goal of this inquiry is to define a family in terms of what it ought to be – a goal that moves our understanding of the family to a new conceptual landscape. I then present my own account of familial relations that aims to capture a normative understanding of the unique primary purpose that the family serves for its members.

Families, Relationships and Societies

2008

2004

The ambition of this paper is to analyse and discuss to what extent the changes in family life towards more individualised family lifestyle are reflected in what family forms the state recognises in eight European countries. The eight countries include the five Nordic countries, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden, United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Germany. The countries can be regarded as representing different welfare regimes, to use the well-known expression of Gøsta .

Families, Relationships and Societies, 2022

David Morgan’s contributions to family sociology started from a direct engagement with theoretical perspectives, but his 1996 publication, Family Connections, took his family sociology in a new, somewhat ‘fuzzy’ direction. Two key motifs for his later work are the emphasis on ‘family’ as an adjective, and its fruitfulness when conjoined with the doing of ‘practices’. Yet his 1996 text also identified key theoretical themes he considered important for family sociology to retain. I trace some of the theoretical concerns that he carried forward in his later work, while drawing attention to some aspects that invite further development, including the significance of everyday family meanings, the challenge of considering ‘family practices’ beyond affluent Minority worlds, and the need to critique the ‘individual’ along with the ‘family’. I offer this discussion on the basis that family sociology is a central issue for sociology in general as a theoretical enterprise.

The British Journal of Sociology, 2004

This paper takes issue with the way in which the individualisation thesis -in which it is assumed that close relationships have become tenuous and fragile -has become so dominant in 'new' sociological theorising about family life. Although others have criticised this thesis, in this paper the main criticism derives from empirical research findings carried out with members of transnational families living in Britain whose values and practices do not fit easily with ideas of individualisation. It is argued that we need a much more complex and less linear notion of how families change across generations and in time.

Research and Science Today