Families : joys, conflicts, and changes / Alex Liazos.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Liazos, Alex, 1941- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Families--United States.

Families.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (332 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Abingdon, Oxon : Routledge, 2016.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Unlike other family textbooks that mostly emphasize conflicts and problems, this book also features the joys and pleasures of family living and its mutually nourishing qualities. Its perspective reflects polls, surveys, and student essays indicating that most people value their families. Families everywhere provide love, support, and sustenance to their members, but they do so in many different arrangements.Understanding the wide variety of families historically and across cultures gives the student a better basis for understanding how families change and a better grasp of more controversial changes such as the gradual acceptance by Westerners of same-sex marriage and child-rearing by single people. Liazos offers two poignant chapters not found in other texts. Family Living (Chapter Six) focuses on the social value of caregiving and family meals. Kin and Community (Chapter Seven) focuses on relationships among kin and the larger community.

Contents:

Cover; Half Title; Title Page; Copyright Page; Dedication; Table of Contents; Preface; Acknowledgments; Chapter 1 Setting the Scene; Family Changes, Family Continuities; Seven Family Scenes; Plymouth Colony, 1680s; A Kentucky Mountain Family, 1887-1946; An Italian Family, 1910s-1930s; A Lesbian Family, 1990s; African American Families Returning South; Working-Class English Families, 1950s; Polynesian Families, 1930s; What Are Families?; Major Themes of the Book; Appendix A: Data on U.S. Families; Appendix B: Some Terms to Understand; Chapter 2 Families in U.S. History

Introduction and OverviewImages and Fears of Family Decline; Colonial Families; Families under Industrialism; Families in the Twentieth Century; Companionate Families and Marriages; Muncie, Indiana, 1890s, 1920s, and 1970s; The 1950s, in Memory and Reality; Enslaved and "Free" African American Families; The African Heritage; African American Families after Emancipation; Northern Free Blacks, 1700-1860; Sharecropping, the Journey North, and the 1950s; Conclusion; Chapter 3 Making Sense of Families; Ideals, Longings, and Realities; Perspectives on Families; The Decline and Demise of Families

Families Are Well and HealthyAnxious, Distressed, and Enduring Families; Power, Feminism, and Families; Letty Cottin Pogrebin; Joan Walsh; Judy Aulette; Judith Stacey; Summary; Sociology, History, and Families; Difficulties in the Study of Families; "The Good Old Days"; The Nuclear Family as "Normal" and Universal; Family Secrets and Façades; Conclusion: Beyond Power Struggles and Conflicts; Chapter 4 Marriage, Cohabitation, and Same-Sex Marriage; Marriages; Why Marry?; Some Statistics on Marriage; Marriages in U.S. History; Good Marriages and the Benefits of Marriage; Research on Marriage

Characteristics of Good MarriagesThe Benefits of Marriage; Marriages over Time; Debates on the State of Marriage; Feminist Critiques; Marriages in Muncie, Indiana, in the 1970s; The Decline of Marriage?; The Rise of Cohabitation; What Is Cohabitation?; The Normalization of Cohabitation in Europe and the United States; Why Do People Cohabit?; Cohabitation and Divorce; Cohabitation and the Law; Same-Sex Couples-and Marriages?; The Struggle for Same-Sex Marriages; Same-Sex Unions in Other Countries; Rights and Benefits; Debates on Same-Sex Marriages; Conclusion; Chapter 5 Parents and Children

The Joys of Childhood and Parenthood"Me and My Dad"; Celebrating a Family's Good Times; Why Have Children?; Parents and Children in Earlier Times; The Mundurucu of the Amazon in the 1950s; The Tikopia of Polynesia in the 1930s; The Mbuti of Zaire; The Montagnais of the St. Lawrence Valley; Our Babies, Ourselves: Some Lessons on Parenting; Bonding; Sleeping; Touching; Feeding; Parents and Children in African American Communities; All Our Kin; Call to Home; Historical Notes on Childhood and Parenting; Children; Parents; Children Today

Busy Parents, Fear, Computers, and the Decline of Childhood?

Notes:

First published 2004 by Paradigm Publishers.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (ebrary, viewed January 25, 2016).

ISBN:

1-317-25971-8

1-317-25970-X

1-315-63466-X

9781315634661

OCLC:

932339466