family. As a result of the decline
of the traditional patriarchal family
model, the conflicting pressures
of home and work now affect both
partners in many couples, putting
a strain on their relationship. The
nature of families, according to
Judith Stacey, is continually
changing to meet the demands
of the modern world and also
responding to and shaping social
norms, so that, for example, single-
parent families and same-sex
couples are no longer considered
unusual in Western societies.
Interpersonal relationships
The more liberal attitude toward
sexual relationships and sexuality
in the West was, however, slow
in coming. In the 1930s and 1940s,
the anthropologist Margaret Mead
helped to pave the way with her
study of gender roles and sexuality
in various cultures around the
world, showing that ideas of
sexual behavior are more a social
construction than a biological fact.
In the West, despite increasing
secularization, religious morality
continued to influence the social
norms of heterosexual relationships
within marriage.
Attitudes toward relationships
changed greatly during the 1960s.
An anti-establishment youth
culture helped break taboos
surrounding sex, advocating
hedonistic free love and a relaxed
view of homosexuality. This change
in culture was echoed by the
academic work of French scholar
Michel Foucault and others.
Foucault believed that the
new openness toward intimate
relationships of all kinds was a wayof challenging the sexual norms
imposed by society, and his ideas
paved the way for the sociological
study of sexuality itself.
In the 1980s, Jeffrey Weeks
applied the idea of sexual norms
as a social construct to his study
of sexuality, and specifically
homosexuality, while Christine
Delphy described the experiences
of lesbians in a predominantly
heterosexual society. Perhaps the
most influential sociologist in this
field of study, however, is Judith
Butler, who advocated challenging
not only notions of sexuality, but
the entire concept of gender and
gender identity too, opening up
a new, and radical, field of study
now known as queer theory, which
calls into question conventional
ideas of what constitutes normal
sexual behavior. ■FAMILIES AND INTIMACIES
1989
1990
1990 S
1995
1997
Judith Stacey’s research
presents radical
alternatives to the
conventional Western
understanding of
a stereotypical
“normal” family.Ulrich Beck and Elisabeth
Beck-Gernsheim examine the
problems of maintaining
close relationships in
modern society in The
Normal Chaos of Love.Steven Seidman rejects
the idea of “normal”
behavior and sexual
identity in Difference
Troubles: Queering Social
Theory and Sexual Politics.Judith Butler pioneers queer
theory by challenging
traditional notions of stable
sexual and gender identity
in Gender Trouble: Feminism
and the Subversion of Identity.Jeffrey Weeks suggests
in Sex, Politics, and
Society that sexuality
is as much socially
constructed as it is
biologically determined.
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