...Ruby-May Birch Homework Examine the patterns of and reasons for domestic violence in society (24 Marks) A definition of domestic violence is given by the Women’s Aid Federation in 2008 is 'physical, psychological, sexual or financial violence that takes place within an intimate or family-type relationship and forms a pattern of coercive and controlling behaviour. It may involve partners, ex-partners, household members or other relatives.’ Sociologists challenge the view that domestic violence is limited to the behaviour of a few disturbed individuals, they argue that there are sociological explanations for domestic violence, domestic violence is far too widespread to be simply the work of these people. According to the British crime survey domestic violence accounts for almost a sixth of all violent crime also domestic violence doesn’t occur at random but follows particular social patterns and in turn has social causes. There are four types of abuse outlined: partner abuse, family abuse, sexual assault and stalking. A shocking pattern in domestic violence is that it is more commonly women than men that experience ‘intimate violence’ across all four types; this was found by Kathryn Coleman et al in 2007. Catriona Mirrlees-Black found similar outcomes when carrying out a survey of 16,000 people in 1999. She found that 99% of all attacks against women were by men...
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...Introduction We all have our own views on what we believe to be family, whether it be the traditional mother, father and children form or the contrasting; two parents of the same sex and adopted children, we all probably would agree that a family consists of people that love each other and adults that rear and prepare children ready for adult life within society. As members of society we have our own individual views as to what constitutes as family, so do sociologists. In this report I will assess the functionalist's sociological theories of the family and introduce other perspectives on the family and show how they differ from the Functionalist perspective, I will concentrate on the conflicting theories of Feminists, Marxists and Postmodernists. Functionalist Perspective Functionalism theory suggests that there is a specific pattern of family organisation corresponding to different types of society. Therefore suggesting there is a particular family form that best suits the conditions of industrial society. Functionalist's believe that the nuclear family replaced the extended families because of industrialisation. Parson claim's the nuclear family is crucial in relation to the socialisation of the young and stabilisation of adult personalities. G P Murdock says: “The family is a social group characterised by common residence, economic co-operation and reproduction. It includes adults of both sexes, at least two of whom maintain a socially approved sexual relationship...
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...What is meant by the term Family? (2) Family is a group of people related by kinship ties such as blood, marriage/civil partnership or adoption. Explain how sociologists may understand childhood as a socially constructed concept (4) The social construction of childhood means that it is not natural as it is a concept with various meanings in different societies. An interactionist known as Aries (1962) suggested that childhood today is a new social invention as during industrialisation children were seen as ‘miniature adults’ as they performed the same work as their parents. Whereas since the 20th century an emergence of a child-centred society is now present. Parents view children as sentimental as they now occupy a central place in the emotional life of home. The state has also contributed to the child-centred society by introducing safe guarding policies as Wells (2009) notes the government of childhood is organised around saving children from internal and external threats. However, not all societies in the world have a concept of childhood which does show that childhood is socially constructed. Suggest three ways in which the form of the typical family has been affected by demographic factors (6) Due to changes in fertility rate the average age of woman giving birth over 30 years old has increased – The use of reliable birth control has enabled woman to have power over reproduction, as well as this the educational opportunities has increased for females which woman...
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...a series of Ideological State Apparatuses (agencies [media, religion, education etc] that spread the dominant ideology and justify the power of the dominant social class). Gramsci developed the concept Hegemony (dominance in society of the ruling class’s set of ideas over others, and acceptance of and consent to them by the rest of society). Pluralism is a view that sees power in society spread among a wide variety of interest groups and individuals, with no single one having a monopoly on power. A Pluralist Ideology is the set of ideas reflecting the pluralist view of the distribution of power with the prevailing ideas in society reflecting the interests of a wide range of social groups and interests. Feminist writers speak of the Patriarchal Ideology which is a set of ideas that supports and tries to justify the power of men. Theories of Science Kuhn argues that scientists work in a Paradigm (the framework of accepted ideas in...
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...Beliefs in society: • Different theories of ideology, science and religion, including both Christian and non-Christian religious traditions. • The relationship between religious beliefs and social change and stability. • Religious organisations, including cults, sects, denominations, churches and New Age movements, and their relationship to religious and spiritual belief and practice. • The relationship between different social groups and religious/spiritual organisations and movements, beliefs and practices. • The significance of religion and religiosity in the contemporary world, including the nature and extent of secularisation in a global context. 1. Religion serves to restore faith and the set basic guidelines for living that people should adhere to; an example of this is the Ten Commandments. 2. It can help to restore faith and a sense of individuality. 3. Maintains a sense of unity and creates hope with the promise of heaven. Explaining belief systems: Belief systems: are broadly defined as the framework of ideas through which an individual makes sense of the world. Ideology: originally a Marxist idea meaning a set of beliefs that serve the interests of a dominant group by justifying their privileged positions. The term usually implies that the beliefs are false or only partially true. Theories of ideology Ideology can be defined in a variety of ways - As a set of political beliefs - As the ideas and beliefs of a particular...
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...Domestic Violence Overview The Women’s Aid Federation (2008) defines domestic violence as: ‘physical, psychological, sexual or financial violence that takes place within an intimate or family-type relationship and forms a pattern of coercive and controlling behaviour. It may involve partners, ex-partners, household members or other relatives.’ A common view of domestic violence is that it is the behaviour of a few disturbed or ‘sick’ individuals, and that its causes are psychological rather than social. However, sociologists have challenged this view. * Domestic violence is far too widespread to be simply the work of a few individuals. According to the British Crime Survey (2007), domestic violence accounts for almost a sixth of all violent crime. Catriona Mirrlees-Black’s (1999) survey of 16,000 people estimates that there are 6.6 million domestic assaults a year, about half involving physical injury. * Domestic violence does not occur randomly, but follows particular social patterns and these patterns have social causes. The most striking of these patterns is that it is mainly violence by men against women. For example, Kathryn Coleman et al (2007) found that women were more likely than men to have experience ‘intimate violence’ across all four types of abuse – partner abuse, family abuse, sexual abuse and stalking. Similarly, Mirrlees-Black found that: * Most Victims are women * 99% of all incidents against women are committed by men * Nearly 1 in 4...
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...Name: SCLY 1: Families and Households Revision Notes 2011-12 By the end of this unit you should be able to * answer any question on families and households ! Key definitions: A family is usually a group of people related by marriage or blood. A household is a person living alone or a group of people living together who may or may not be related. Theories of the family From the specification: The relationship of the family to the social structure and social change * Functionalist views: the importance of the nuclear family, the universality of the family, changing functions, how the nuclear family ‘fits’ modern society. * Marxist views: the family as part of the ideological state apparatus, as an agent of social control. * Feminist views: patriarchy; liberal, radical and Marxist feminism. Consensus/Positive views of the family | Conflict/critical views of the family | * Functionalist theories: the family performs positive functions for individuals and society * New Right theories: the family is the cornerstone of society, but it is under threat | * Marxist theories: the family provides important functions for capitalism * Feminist theories: the family reinforces gender inequality and patriarchy | Functionalist theories GP Murdock | Evaluation | Murdock argues that the family is a universal institution (it exists everywhere) that performs four major functions: * Stable satisfaction of the sex drive with the same partner, preventing the...
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...Impact of Societal Social Institutions on People These embody all the ideas and beliefs of members of the society about how they think their lives should be organized. Dominant ideas and beliefs are those usually of the ruling class or the rich and powerful and tend to be the ones people find legitimate. Minority and weaker beliefs are also apart of the social institution but are not felt to be legitimate by the majority of the society and so may be suppressed and alienated. These ideas are normally in competition with one another for supremacy. So how can ideas be the building block of an entire society. Each institution becomes tangible through social organizations. So religious beliefs of the Christian are made tangible through the church. The ideas and beliefs forming the institution become concrete in the society through social organisations which reflect how these ideas are held. In each institution there are values (ideas on how something should be ranked in society), norms (yardsticks and standards that have evolved on how we should act), statuses (assigned positions or locations), and roles (expectations of behaviour). They are then the fundamental building blocks of society and vary over time and are based on the ideals which the people of the society have on accomplishing the tasks of living together collectively The Family Nancie Solien defines the family as "group of people bound by that complex set of relationships known as kinship ties“. It is the basic unit within...
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...CHAPTER-I INTRODUCTION The subject of matriarchal studies is the investigation and presentation of non-patriarchal societies of past and present. Even today there are enclaves of societies with matriarchal patterns in Asia, Africa, America and Oceania. None of these is a mere reversal of patriarchy where women rule -as it is often commonly believed -instead, they are all egalitarian societies, without exception. This means they do not know hierarchies, classes and the domination of one gender by the other. They are societies free of domination, but they still have their regulations. And this is the fact that makes them so attractive in any search for a new philosophy, to create a just society. Equality does not merely mean a levelling of differences. The natural differences between the genders and the generations are respected and honoured, but they never serve to create hierarchies, as is common in patriarchy. The different genders and generations have their own honour and through complimentary areas of activity, they are geared towards each other. This can be observed on all levels of society: the economic level, the social level, the political level and the areas of their worldviews and faiths. More precisely matriarchies are societies with complementary equality, where great care is taken to provide a balance. This applies to the balance between genders, among generations, and between humans and nature. The differentiated rules of matriarchal societies have been...
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...The Family - Murdock Murdock Functionalist; family is universal institution that performs 4 major functions: * Stable Satisfaction of the Sex Drive - prevents social disruption caused by sexual 'free-for-all'. * Reproduction of Next Generation - means society able to continue. * Socialisation of the Young - spreading society's norms and values. * Meeting Member's Economic Needs - providing food, shelter, etc. Criticisms of Murdock * Marxists - reject consensus view; argue that Murdock neglects dark side of family. Claim meets needs of capitalists, not family. * Feminists - reject consensus, 'rose-tinted' view, argue that Murdock ignores women's oppression and inequality. See family as serving needs of men and exploiting women. The Family - Parsons Parsons Functionalist; family has 2 'basic and irreducible' functions: * Primary Socialisation of Children - happens in early stages of child's life; child learns norms, values, etc of culture they are born into. * Stabilisation of Adult Personalities - family provides place for adults to relax, escape stresses of working life and feel emotionally secure. Criticisms of Parsons * Too deterministic - children are moulded by all-powerful adults. Also ignores possibility of socialisation being 2-way process where by socialisation can be resisted by children. * Zaretsky - family only provides such emotional support so members can spend another day under harsh capitalist oppression. Family is...
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...modernization, they became more widespread and inflationary in India. Modernizing forces, namely colonialism and commercialization, have been at work in India for years, and they would prima facie be expected to suppress such primitive practices. However, even after more than forty years of its prohibition, the practice has spread and has increasingly ingrained itself in the institution of marriage. A dowry is the transfer of parental property to a daughter as her inheritance at her marriage (i.e. inter vivos) rather than at the owner's death (mortis causa). A dowry establishes a type of conjugal fund, the nature of which may vary widely.Dowry contrasts with the related concepts of bride price and dower. While bride price (or bride service) is a payment by the groom or his family to the bride's parents, dowry is the wealth transferred from the bride's family to the groom or his family, ostensibly for the bride. Similarly, dower[->0] is the property settled on the bride herself by the groom at the time of marriage and which remains under her ownership and control. The tensions between India's patriarchal traditions and modernism can be seen in the struggle against dowry violence.Marriage in India is steeped in traditions and deep-rooted cultural beliefs. Practices are passed down by word of mouth and in some cases, re-interpreted to align with the changing times. There is, however, one custom that stubbornly...
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...changing roles of women overtime. * How marriage and religion as institutions of marriage and religion, which are founded on a patriarchal tradition, contribute to women’s powerlessness and silence, especially under the HIV/AIDS regime. KENYA WOMEN IN THE PRE-COLONIAL AND COLONIAL PERIOD The British colonized Kenya for over 60 years and she was granted her independence on 12 December,1963. In 1964, the country became a republic, with Jomo Kenyatta as its first president. In order to understand the position of Kenyan women in the modern political and economic dispensation, it is necessary to make clear the structures under which they operated before the colonial period and during the colonial era. The status of Kenyan women deteriorated during the colonial rule. This deterioration was particularly noticeable because, in the pre-colonial era, although women were to some extent subordinate to men under the African customary law, in many respects the roles of women were complementary in nature’ Pre-colonial Kenyan communities practiced subsistence agriculture and some forms of trade. Production was only meant to meet the basic needs of the family as opposed to profits. Division of labour was gender based women performed between 70 and 80 % of the total workload available.one of the important features carried over from traditional to modern Kenya is the importance of marriage and family.the ideal family is still seen as one with a male bread winner,and a wife is seen as one...
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...different ways. Parsons describes the division of labour in the traditional nuclear family in terms of an expressive role and an instrumental role. However, this traditional arrangement may have changed as families have changed, and many feminists use the term ‘dual burden’ to describe the woman’s role in the family today. Item 2B Government policies and laws include tax and benefit policies as well as legislation such as relating to divorce and marriage. Sociologists have different views on the impact of these policies and laws on families. For example, feminists argue that social policies assume that the ideal family is a patriarchal nuclear family, and that government policies and laws therefore favour this sort of family. On the other hand, the New Right argue that the benefit system undermines traditional nuclear families by actively encouraging lone parents. 0 6 Explain what is meant by the ‘dual burden’ (Item 2A). (2 marks) 0 7 Explain the difference between the expressive role and the instrumental role (Item 2A). (4 marks) 0 8 Suggest three ways in which the differences between children and adults are becoming less clear in society today. (6 marks) 0 9 Examine the reasons for, and the effects of, changes in family size over the past 100 years or so. (24 marks) 1 0 Using material from Item 2B and elsewhere, assess sociological views of the impact of government policies and laws on family life. Item 2A Over the past 40 years or so, there has been a decline in the...
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...Sociological Theories A sociological theory is a set of ideas that provides an explanation for human society. Theories are selective in terms of their priorities and perspectives and the data they define as significant. As a result they provide a particular and partial view of reality. Sociological theories can be grouped together according to a variety of criteria. The most important of these is the distinction between Structural and Social action theories. Structural or macro perspectives analyses the way society as a whole fits together. Structural theory sees society as a system of relationships that creates the structure of the society in which we live. It is this structure that determines our lives and characters. Structured sets of social relationships are the 'reality' that lie below the appearance of 'the free individual' of western individualism. Structuralism focuses on the particular set of 'structural laws' that apply in any one society. Despite their differences, both functionalism and Marxism use a model of how society as a whole works. Many functionalists base their model of society around the assumption of basic needs and go to explain how different parts of society help to meet those needs. Marxists, on the other hand, see society as resting upon an economic base or infrastructure, with a superstructure above it. They see society as divided into social classes which have the potential to be in conflict with each other. However, the main differences...
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...thousands of women lives each year. Believed to have originated as a patriarchal tribal custom, honor killings are a global phenomenon. A 2000 report by the UN Population Fund estimated that as many as 5,000 women and girls are killed each year by relatives for allegedly dishonoring their family. While the practice is often associated with Muslim cultures, it also happens among Christians, Hindus and Sikhs. However, an independent British study suggested the practice is strongest in Pakistan and Turkey. In a 2009 edition of the U.S. policy journal Middle East Quarterly, American feminist writer Phyllis Chesler argued that honor killings are distinct from domestic violence. According to Chesler, honor killings differ from domestic abuse because they are planned in advance and often rely on collusion between multiple family members (The history). In Pakistan, honor killing is when the society or family kills a person because they believe that person has somehow destroyed family honor or ashamed them in front of the society. Honor killing is locally known as karo-kari here karo stand for black male and kari for black female, originally used metaphorically for adulterer and adulteress but with the passage of time it got connoted with many immoral behaviors. Generally the victims of honor killings are both male and female but because the karo get the chance to flee while kari are stuck with their families, the...
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