1950s-style portrayals of the perfect nuclear family MYTH
Aug 3, 2016 13:23:52 GMT -5
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Post by apple on Aug 3, 2016 13:23:52 GMT -5
Exploding the nuclear family myth
Marriages may have lasted longer in the 1950s, but divorces were difficult to obtain and frowned upon by society. The swinging sixties, however, saw huge social changes and the introduction of the 1969 Divorce Reform Act.
As a result UK divorce rates soared between the 1970s and early 1990s to become some of the highest in the world, increasing by 4.9% in 2010 possibly due to strains on relationships caused by the recession. Despite this, in a recent BBC poll, four out of five people in a relationship said they were happy.
Unmarried couples are opting to cohabit more and put off getting married and having children until later on in life. With the average wedding costing around £20,000 many people are choosing instead to save for a house deposit.
Complex families
The modern family is increasingly complex and has changed profoundly, with greater acceptance for unmarried cohabitation, divorce, single-parent families, same-sex partnerships and complex extended family relations. Grandparents are also doing their bit – a study by Cardiff University showed that one in four working families rely on grandparents for childcare.
Research carried out by Cambridge University suggests that gay fathers have more interaction with their children and their kids tend to have busier social lives when compared to a traditional family.
Children in single parent families can be just as happy as those with both sets of parents, according to a 2014 survey by NatCen Social Research. The quality of the relationship with the primary carer matters most, rather than the number of parents.
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The postwar nuclear family headed by a breadwinning man and homemaker wife that's become the "traditional" measuring stick against which today's families are judged is more mythical ideal than bygone reality, says Stephanie Coontz, a professor of history and family studies at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington.
Through most of history, the whole family — including the children — worked to support the family, she says, and it wasn't until the 1920s that large numbers of men started earning wages working for other people, children went to school instead of work and women took over the domestic sphere. That model receded during the Great Depression and the Second World War, then came "roaring back" in the postwar era, Coontz says, but it was the norm only for one brief moment of human history.
"A big myth is the idea that male providing was the traditional family," she says. "Women were co-providers throughout most of history."
That postwar model became an emblem of family life in part because it coincided with an economic boom time when real wages were rising and inequality was shrinking, she says.
"We look back at the prosperity and compare it with the stagnation that we have today, and it's easy to say, 'Well, it was the families that made that work,' but in fact it was that economic prosperity that allowed those families," Coontz says.
The 1950s nuclear family was immortalized in popular culture just as television was influencing its first mass audiences, she says, and there was a "huge cultural push" everywhere from psychiatry to women's magazines to declare the breadwinner-homemaker model the perfect form and women with other desires defective in some way.
link
Marriages may have lasted longer in the 1950s, but divorces were difficult to obtain and frowned upon by society. The swinging sixties, however, saw huge social changes and the introduction of the 1969 Divorce Reform Act.
As a result UK divorce rates soared between the 1970s and early 1990s to become some of the highest in the world, increasing by 4.9% in 2010 possibly due to strains on relationships caused by the recession. Despite this, in a recent BBC poll, four out of five people in a relationship said they were happy.
Unmarried couples are opting to cohabit more and put off getting married and having children until later on in life. With the average wedding costing around £20,000 many people are choosing instead to save for a house deposit.
Complex families
The modern family is increasingly complex and has changed profoundly, with greater acceptance for unmarried cohabitation, divorce, single-parent families, same-sex partnerships and complex extended family relations. Grandparents are also doing their bit – a study by Cardiff University showed that one in four working families rely on grandparents for childcare.
Research carried out by Cambridge University suggests that gay fathers have more interaction with their children and their kids tend to have busier social lives when compared to a traditional family.
Children in single parent families can be just as happy as those with both sets of parents, according to a 2014 survey by NatCen Social Research. The quality of the relationship with the primary carer matters most, rather than the number of parents.
link
The postwar nuclear family headed by a breadwinning man and homemaker wife that's become the "traditional" measuring stick against which today's families are judged is more mythical ideal than bygone reality, says Stephanie Coontz, a professor of history and family studies at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington.
Through most of history, the whole family — including the children — worked to support the family, she says, and it wasn't until the 1920s that large numbers of men started earning wages working for other people, children went to school instead of work and women took over the domestic sphere. That model receded during the Great Depression and the Second World War, then came "roaring back" in the postwar era, Coontz says, but it was the norm only for one brief moment of human history.
"A big myth is the idea that male providing was the traditional family," she says. "Women were co-providers throughout most of history."
That postwar model became an emblem of family life in part because it coincided with an economic boom time when real wages were rising and inequality was shrinking, she says.
"We look back at the prosperity and compare it with the stagnation that we have today, and it's easy to say, 'Well, it was the families that made that work,' but in fact it was that economic prosperity that allowed those families," Coontz says.
The 1950s nuclear family was immortalized in popular culture just as television was influencing its first mass audiences, she says, and there was a "huge cultural push" everywhere from psychiatry to women's magazines to declare the breadwinner-homemaker model the perfect form and women with other desires defective in some way.
link
