View source for 426--Week 14 Questions/Comments--Thursday

== Change over Time ==
How has the American family changed over time in the 20th century?  What distinguishes each decade?  How does this work with our notions of "what the ideal family is?"  How does each decade compare to the 19th century families we have studied all semester?

Ok, this question demands a long answer but I'm going to briefly write that gender roles have constantly changed throughout the century, and the economy has affected these family roles. From the "Companionate Family," where husband and wives became friends and lovers and children became friends, to the influx of women entering the workforce and some men becoming "mr. mom," the roles have constantly changed in this one century. The economy always played a role in the family too, whether it was the Depression causing a decline in divorces, marriages and birthrates, or the Fifties creating the "ideal" family, the increase of birthrates, and the suburb family, the changes have been numerous and constant. - Celia

Changing gender roles, have the most impact on the different definitions of family.  Each decade has had a slightly new gender ideal that shaped the way the family unit evolved.  As one gender had more "power" in the relationship the other adapted slightly to allow for the influx in control.  One thing that we did notice was the overwhelming majority of male dominated society; however, I was very impressed with the amount of power and control that women had a various times.  A family's economic status is also key, because if it is financially necessary both husband and wife share dominance.  It also seemed that in many cases dominance has some relation to work, and it seems work outside the home. -- Kellye Sorber

While I agree that changing gender roles was a main aspect of change in families over the decades of the 20th century, I think that different ideas concerning children and family size also impacted the nature of the American family. As family size decreased ideas of the "ideal family" changed. Today, everything seems to built around the notion that a family consists of 4 people, 2 parents and 2 children. I think this is a very different notion then people had at the turn of the last century. --Sarah Gardner

== Today? ==
How is today's American family difference/similar to the ones from Mintz and Kellogg and the article which are 20 and 10 years old respectivly?

It's kind of amazing to see how quickly the "family" can change in such a short amount of time.  As we've noted, there are a variety of family types that make it almost impossible to nail down one distinct definition of what the family is.  Even in the 20 years it's been since Mintz & Kellogg published their little gem, the family has continued to grow and adapt.  Who knew families were really so complicated? -Kelly W.

== Mintz and Kellogg, Chapter 6: The Rise of the Companionate Family, 1900-1930 ==
On page 109, Mintz and Kellogg mentioned that the companionate family is a model and ideal "of family function and behavior, which remains with us today."  However, I think that the model of family is changing today because, Kellogg and Mintz metioned people stayed together because of friendship and love but right now, divorce rates are going down with the sited reason that people cannot afford to not be together.  So, currently the model is evolving because of the economy with people staying together for financial concerns. -- Ashley Wilkins

There were a lot of parallels to other readings in the 107-201 M&K reading.  I was reminded of Riley when reading about divorce and May with childlessness, "shirking duties" and the decline in the birth rate.  It was a little frightening how much M&K gloss over the material in order to cover it all, but still very interesting.  I am curious about the 1890 "watershed" that was described on page 112.  M&K didn't do a good job explaining why that year was so pivotal, or why it might have been.  I found the changes in childbirth and child rearing very interesting: to know why most births began to take place in hospitals.  Some of the parenting ideas were completely nuts, like not encouraging their kids to laugh or show affection to babies.  It's a wonder people from that era turned out at all!  When reading about the Great Depression I was thinking a lot about parallels to today.  It definitely made me think that things are not nearly as bad as they could be, but that just like M&K say, single parent families, the disabled and the elderly are the hardest hit by rough economic times.  In the later periods discussed, I couldn't believe the short marriages that took place during WWII.  It was interesting to read also how that time period affected divorce laws, and how frequent unfaithfulness was for GIs.  Finally it was nice to see the transition toward the equality movement: with men taking an interest in their homes and families, that began in the 1950s.--Amanda

The last chapter and epilogue show the radical shift that took place between the early chapters of the book and the end.  During the first part of Chapter X I kept thinking of my Pop Culture class, and how we studied Ozzie&Harriet, The Cosbys, and Gilmore Girls as 3 case studies of the American family.  It seems to me that the 1960s-80s saw the most marked jump.  As M&K discussed, family life may have included more equality between husbands and wives, but this was also the era of Playboy and topless bars.  Also, family law because its own industry of cases and lawyers, which set the stage for the Family Court/Divorce Court tv shows of today.  It's really amazing to see how much the family transitioned over 200 years.--Amanda

I too was really amazed with the change from the beginning to the end of Mintz & Kellogg.  While the beginning seemed to focuses on the stereotypical family, like we remember from older TV shows.  Yet toward the end they shifted to a more equal partner ship among husband and wife.  I liked how M&K looked at the impact the changing family had on children in the 60s and 70s. As well as how divorce rates have led to new ways of raising children. -- Kellye Sorber

I found it interesting to read on page 240 how the word "family" has been used by both conservative and liberal politicians in the 1980's. Conservatives used the word to mean "traditional social values" to express opposition to big government involvement, while the liberals used the word to mean "compassion" in order to increase government involvement with the poor and so on. The fact that the word "family" was used by both teams over the role of government in American life reestablishes the debate on what is "family" and how does society define it? Is it a small, inclusive unit, or something that the whole community is involved with. We have seen throughout this semester that opinions on this have changed over the nineteenth, and now the twentieth centuries. It is also interesting that conservatives used the word "family" to mean traditional social values. But these values have changed so much over time it is hard to put our finger on what these traditional values are. - Celia


== Mintz and Kellogg Chapter 7: American Families Face the Great Depression ==

I find it really interesting how much families come together during times of need.  This was shown during the Great Depression when people relied on each other for food, money, work etc.  This is not a new thing created during the depression, but it is a common theme for most of the families we discussed in class.  I just think it is really encouraging that even when things are rough, people (for the most part) can turn to their families for support (also a parallel to today, though not to the extreme of the depression).  -- Kari W. 

== Mintz and Kellogg Chapter 8: Families on the Home Front ==

One section I found particularly interesting was the reaction couples had after WWII. I couldn’t help but think of my grandfather who was a soldier in D-Day and was later injured. Upon returning home he had a similar reaction to the Army Captain on p. 171. His wife and he realized very quickly that too many things had changed and ended up like so many couples getting a divorce. I think it is an interesting stress on families that is not necessarily given the attention it deserves. Not only the stress of war, but of other traumatic events, that ultimately change a marriage and push a couple towards divorce. -Mary Beth 

== Mintz and Kellogg Chapter 9: The Golden Age - Families of the 1950s ==
It's incredible to me how people today still compare families to the families of the 1950s.  With everything from "Leave it to Beaver" to "Pleasantville" Americans today continue to romanticize the 1950s and the "perfect family."  It's no wonder, though, with the age of marriage at a dramatic low and a birthrate that skyrocketed that there were ideal family households in the middle class.  It was a return to "normalcy;" a sense of stability that had been disrupted by WWII. -Kelly W.

I also like how much the media played into this "perfect family" as Kelly puts it, not only now, but also during the fifties.  All the advertisements showing these perfect wives with their perfect lives -- cooking dinner, ironing her husband's shirts and reading a book all at the same time!  That stereotype was a ridiculously high standard to live up to.  It really is no wonder that so many people rebelled against this "ideal" in decades to come. -- Kari W.

I thought that the role television people played in influencing past images of American families was really interesting. I know watching shows on Nick at Nick such as "I Love Lucy," "Hazel," and "The Donna Reed Show," has forever impacted my view and impressions of this time period. Its hard for me to imagine a woman of the period, such as Mrs. Cleaver, not smiling while serving their busbands supper. While these shows clearly impact our view of the 50s and 60s today, I never considered the impact these shows had at the time they aired. I also think its interesting how the shows such as "Leave it to Beaver" are shows that parents could aspire to whereas I don't know if parents always feel the same about today's television shows. --Sarah Gardner

== Stacey Article ==
The author's opinions certainly do show in this article.  It was interesting to read about the origins of these movements in the 90s, because I think most of us were kids and oblivious to what was going on.  Stacey portrayed Pat Moynihan in a very different light than M&K.  Stacey clearly feels that gay and lesbian couple have second class options for marriage and child rearing, and that the fights over babies and other legal battles have caused people to preach, fight and protest what she sees as a new reality in the American family.--Amanda

I had some problems with Stacey's article, mainly because (and it could be from skimming) it seemed like one moment she was all for gay and lesbians coming out and being able to be married and raise a family, and the next I felt like she was against it.  However, I liked how in the end she decided that, "[i]n th name of our families, and of democracy, we must move forward, not backward, to address the great social threats that imperil us all." (pg 398-9)  Now, whether she means death to gay/bi marriage and families, or that as Americans, we need to move forward with policies and address policies with a changing nation instead of trying to revert to what family and life was decades and centuries ago, I don't know.  However, I prefer to think she meant the later. --Ashley Wilkins


On page 384, Stacey is talking about how legal gay marriage would impact the homosexual community, and one point jumped out at me as really strange. Stacey says that:  "conservatives agree that legalizing gay marriage would further marginalize sexual radicals by segregating counter-cultural gays and lesbians from the 'whitebread' gay couples who could then choose to marry their way into Middle America." This sentence really surprised me. "Whitebread" gay couples??? Does our society really make a distinction between "whitebread" gays and "counter-cultural" gays? I think being gay in our society is pretty counter-cultural in and of itself. I am pretty skeptical of this idea that gay couples would be accepted in Middle America just because they were married. -- Rebecca

I agree with you Rebecca, I think that she's going a little too far in defining it.  I think that she is talking about some of the more disturbing (not necessarily the best way to put it) things that people dream up about sexual deviants.  To their thinking the 'whitebread' gays and lesbians would, I guess, be more acceptable. -Lacey

I found the introduction about classifying “gay families” by one person’s or one couple’s sexual orientation interesting. She brings up an interesting point. Simply because one member of the family is of another ethnicity or religion, the family itself does not change to meet the definition of its one member. It brings up another aspect of American families in attempting to define them and understand ways to categorize different families. – Mary Beth

I found this article really interesting, I couldn't think of another article while I've read at UMW that was so "liberal." Maybe I'm in this political mindset lately having to listen to Rush for two hours Monday at my internship...-Joyce

Also, I did a little research on the author, and she's a professor at NYU and strong advocate for gay rights (no surprise there!) but I saw a short interview where she defended gay partnerships with children as being just as supportive and loving as heterosexual couples because, she said, a homosexual couple actually has to make the choice to become parents-sometimes heterosexual couples have children by accident so they may not be as ready as if they chose to be parents. Also, she defended gay parents by giving evidence that most homosexual parents are usually older and have been together longer than heterosexual parents.--just food for thought, honestly I haven't really made up my mind on gay parenting but I would say her article is very persuasive.-Joyce

I also thought that this was an interesting article although I have to agree with Joyce that this piece is rather liberal leaning. I thought it was also interesting how lesbians parent more then gay men do and that children said they enjoyed having two moms and believed their friends would be jealous of them. While I imagine that having two moms must be great, I wonder if they will ever get the masculine influences of a father-figure in their lives. That said, many children of single-mom grow up just fine without a live-in father figure. --Sarah Gardner

== Domestic Partnerships ==

Hey guys, I thought you might find this interesting. According to my company's insurance provider, these are the criteria you have to meet in order to have your relationship be considered a domestic partenship. I think it is interesting to see the rules spelled out like this, because it gets at how we define family. (or how we define marriage outside of the institution of marriage)

Also, using these rules, I was able to get my boyfriend on my health insurance policy as my domestic partner, which was a huge benefit for us. This is an example of something that came up a lot in Stacey's article, that these types of policies, that exist because of the efforts of gay rights advocates, have a big impact on non-gay relationships as well.  -- Rebecca


Domestic partners may be of the same sex or of opposite sexes.

Domestic partners must:<br>
• Be parties to a government-recognized civil union or government-recognized
same sex marriage, or be included in a government domestic partner registry<br>
OR<br>
• Be least 18 years of age,<br>
• Have the legal capacity to contract,<br>
• Share a close, committed, and exclusive personal relationship that is meant to be
of lasting duration,<br>
• Have shared a common legal residence continuously for at least 3 months,<br>
• Be financially interdependent,<br>
• Not be parties to a legally recognized marriage either to each other or anyone else,<br>
• Not share blood or familial relationship that would be bar marriage under the laws
of the state in which the couple resides, nor be a member of another domestic
partnership or substantially similar relationship, and<br>
• Not have been a member of another domestic partnership or substantially similar
relationship within the past 6 months.<br>

<br>
Financial interdependence may be established with any of the following documents:<br>
• Joint mortgage or lease on place of residence<br>
• Joint title on motor vehicle<br>
• Agreement establishing joint bank account or credit card account<br>
• Agreement with a third party lender for joint repayment of indebtedness<br>
• Designation of one partner as the other’s beneficiary for life insurance or
retirement benefits<br>
• A joint will, or reciprocal wills in which each partner designates the other as
executor or primary beneficiary<br>
• Durable powers of attorney by each partner in favor of the other<br>
• Health care directives or living wills in which each partner gives the other the
authority to make health care decisions<br>

Wow, that is really interesting and to some extent not hard to come by, meaning that you can get financial interdependence from the power of attorneys for each other, though it does require some level of commitment.  I think its really interesting and slightly ironic that gay rights activisim is the cause for legislation that in fact helps some people who are most adamantly against gay rights.  -Lacey