Femininst View of the Family

malestream views on the family in sociology

• liberal

• radical

• marxist

• difference/ intersectional

• postmodernist

it is patriarchal, unequal, and gendered

socialisation within the family is gendered, and this bleeds into other institutions

Somerville

gradual social change

society is a capitalist patriarchy that exploits women

through unpaid emotional labour

Ansley

men are the problem and the family increases violence against women

Dobash and Dobash

not every woman experiences patriarchy and thus the family in the same way

Dunne and Mirza

translates Parson’s Warm Bath Theory into a feminist framework, and sees that women are takers of shit - they act as a ‘safety valve’, absorbing their husband’s legitimate anger and frustration from the workplace

• this way the capitalist system is not threatened

• evidence suggests that people are still drawn to the idea of and the structure of the family

• it is not just men that experience frustration

despite rising divorce rates, remarriage rates are also rising

the changing role of women shows that more women are entering the workplace

male frustration from poor working conditions and low pay can manifest in domestic abuse

they provide unpaid work, through things such as the triple shift (doing paid work as well as house work and emotion work due to their expressive role), the gender pay gap means they are reliant on men, and thus trapped in situations of domestic abuse

£1.01 trillion (56% of GDP)

78%

paying women the same amount of money for work, making housework paid (this may incentivise men to help)

the Equal Pay Act

• the theory of the glass ceiling suggests that women aren’t given the same opportunities for promotions as men are

• zero hours contracts

• gendered socialisation/ the education system leading girls into low-paid jobs that are extensions of the expressive role (eg. nursing which we know is poorly paid because of recent strikes)

industrialisation has led to the separation of paid work from the home, and thus to female subordination through economic dependence on men

• women were pushed out of the workplace during industrialisation

• the housewife/ expressive role is thus not biological it was constructed

• even though the 20th Century saw more women returning to work, the expressive role is still seen as the woman’s primary role, and they are thus further exploited through having to do housework and paid work

  • women who do work are often concentrated in low-paid jobs that are an extension of the caring role (eg. nursing)

• an unequal domestic division of labour is not an inevitable outcome of capitalism

• studies show that men are becoming more involved in housework (the New Man)

  • however, these studies don’t quantify how much housework men are doing

Wilmott and Young - they both take the March of Progress view

reform rather than revolution is a better way to approach improving the position of women in the family

• increased choice and the growth of dual-worker families has created greater equality in marriage

• policies to help working parents, such as increased flexibility in paid employment will help further

no

• the paternity act only allows men 2 weeks of leave, reinforcing the woman’s expressive role

  • the Equal Pay Act has failed to close the gender pay gap, because of zero hours contracts and the gendered socialisation in education

the privatised nuclear family allows for the state not to get involved in familial matters, so things like marital rape often get swept under the rug - evidence for this is that it was not illegal until the end of the 20th century

patriarchal, heterosexual marriage legitimises violence against women by conferring power and authority on men and economic dependence on women

• violence can be triggered by perceived threats to male authority

domestic violence doesn’t just exist within heterosexual marriage, and men are not always beneficiaries of patriarchy

women are more likely to be feminists, as with radical feminism appearing more in the media, men believe that giving equality to women has gone far enough

• statistics show that this attitude is incredibly prevalent among male bosses and this suggests why women are unable to advance in the workforce (the glass ceiling)

a black feminist, Mirza examines the way in which stereotypes of black women negatively perceive working class black women as dependent on benefits and middle class black women as superwomen, and as such negatively effect mothers and fathers of both classes

lesbian couples, as same-sex couples, are more likely to negotiate the domestic division of labour within their families, as they are less likely to follow ‘gender scripts’

we live in an era of increased choice, and according to her ethnographic study of Silicon Valley, women are using this increased choice to leave patriarchal relationships and select new family arrangements

despite the increase in family diversity, reproductive technology etc, the mainstream political ideology still sees the nuclear family as the most desirable type

they focus too much on a Western perspective of family life