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Description
Flashcards by Dinah Bennett, updated more than 1 year ago
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Created by Dinah Bennett
about 7 years ago
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| Question | Answer |
| What is functionalism? | -functionalists believe that society is based on value consensus -often compare society to a biological organism like the human body -see the family as a particularly important subsystem of society |
| Murdock's (1949) contributions (Part 1) | -believes the family is universal -the family preforms 4 essential functions: >sexual: monogamous relationship prevents social disruption and anarchy >reproduction: continues society |
| Murdock's (1949) contributions (Part 2) | >socialisation: teaches society's shared norms and values >economic: consumption and production of goods |
| Murdock Criticisms | -functions can easily be preformed by other institutions or non-nuclear family structures -neglects conflict and exploitation |
| Murdock Criticisms continued | -feminists: ignores the oppression of women in the family -Marxists: ignores how the family serves capitalism, and not the family members or society on a whole |
| Parsons' (1955) Contributions | - focuses on nuclear family in modern industrial society -the family has become more specialised -the family still retains 2 basic functions: |
| Parsons' (1955) Contributions (Part 2) | >primary socialisation: most important part of socialisation proccess; personality factories >stabilisation of adult personalities: unstable personalities can threaten the stability of society; marriage provides emotional support |
| Parsons' (1955) Contributions (Part 3) | -believes the family is a geographically mobile workforce: easier for the compact two generation family (modern society family) to move than for the three generation extended family (pre-industrial society family) |
| Parsons Criticisms | -married couples and families are pictured as living in harmony ignores the 'dark side' of family life -doesn't look at dysfunctions of family life that may be harmful to wider society -ignores class, ethnicity, religion, locality -sexist |
| EVIDENCE AGAINST PARSONS | Young and Willmott (1973) finds little evidence of the extended family in pre-industrial Britain Peter Laslett's (1972) study of English households from 1564-1821 found that almost all family's were nuclear |
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