<\/p>\n
Q. Critically examine the functionalists views on the institution of family. How do those help us in understanding family in the present times. (2014)<\/strong><\/p>\n Model Answer<\/strong><\/p>\n Functionalists regard society as a system made up of different parts which depend on each other. Different institutions each perform specific functions within a society to keep that society going, in the same way as the different organs of a human body perform different functions in order to maintain the whole.<\/p>\n In functionalist thought, the family is a particularly important institution as this it the \u2018basic building block\u2019 of society which performs the crucial functions of socialising the young and meeting the emotional needs of its members. Stable families underpin social order and economic stability.<\/p>\n Murdock suggested there were \u2018four essential functions\u2019 of the family:<\/p>\n Parson\u2019s has a historical perspective on the evolution of the nuclear family. His functional fit theory is that as society changes, the type of family that \u2018fits\u2019 that society, and the functions it performs change. Over the last 200 years, society has moved from pre-industrial to industrial \u2013 and the main family type has changed from the extended family to the nuclear family. The nuclear family fits the more complex industrial society better, but it performs a reduced number of functions.<\/p>\n The extended family consisted of parents, children, grandparents and aunts and uncles living under one roof, or in a collection of houses very close to each other. Such a large family unit \u2018fitted\u2019 pre-industrial society as the family was entirely responsible for the education of children, producing food and caring for the sick \u2013 basically it did everything for all its members.<\/p>\n In contrast to pre-industrial society, in industrial society (from the 1800s in the UK) the isolated \u201cnuclear family\u201d consisting of only parents and children becomes the norm. This type of family \u2018fits\u2019 industrial societies because it required a mobile workforce. The extended family was too difficult to move when families needed to move to find work to meet the requirements of a rapidly changing and growing economy. Furthermore, there was also less need for the extended family as more and more functions, such as health and education, gradually came to be carried out by the state.<\/p>\n Ronald Fletcher<\/strong>\u00a0also analyses the family in modern times from a Functionalist perspective but he denies that the modern nuclear family has lost functions to the extent suggested By Talcott Parsons. Thus Fletcher argues that even if the family is no longer a unit of production, it is a unit of consumption which can be appealed to by advertisers keen to sell a wide range of household appliances so as to maintain profits. Also parents do supplement school education by providing advice and help more effectively than in the past; greater understanding of diet and exercise may mean that the family can play a greater role in health maintenance; and also given the limitations of the Welfare State, the family, and especially women within the family may continue to play a major role in the care of elderly relatives some of whom may not wish to enter old people s homes.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Q. Critically examine the functionalists views on the institution of family. How do those help us in understanding family<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3688,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[114],"tags":[392],"class_list":["post-3687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sociology-optional","tag-union-public-service-commission-upsc"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3687"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3687\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3689,"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3687\/revisions\/3689"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/triumphias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
\n2. The biological reproduction of the next generation \u2013 without which society cannot continue.
\n3. Socialisation of the young \u2013 teaching basic norms and values
\n4. Meeting its members economic needs \u2013 producing food and shelter for example.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\nTalcott Parsons \u2013 Functional Fit Theory<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Parsons \u2013 The two essential or irreducible functions of the family<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\n