The Sociology Book

310

W E S T E R N F A M I L Y

A R R A N G E M E N T S

A R E D I V E R S E , F L U I D ,

AND UNRESOLVED

JUDITH STACEY

T

he “modern” US family

unit, praised by the likes

of Talcott Parsons, is

a dated and potentially oppressive

institution. This is the view of

Judith Stacey, professor emerita of

social and cultural analysis at New

York University, whose work has

focused on the family, queer theory,

sexuality, and gender. Based on her

detailed research into families

in Silicon Valley, California,

Stacey suggests that, in line

with demands from a changing

economic structure resulting in

poverty and unemployment, the

family has undergone a radical

shift. Marriage is also weaker

because women are rejecting

patriarchal relationships. Instead,

Western

economic

structures

have shifted.

Traditional

family roles

of male

breadwinner/

female

homemaker are

no longer

relevant.

These changes enable “brave new family” forms.

Western family arrangements are diverse,

fluid, and unresolved.

Women are

rejecting

patriarchal

relationships.

IN CONTEXT

FOCUS

The postmodern family

KEY DATES

1970 US radical feminist Kate

Millet argues that the nuclear

family is a site of subordination

for women.

1977 In Haven in a Heartless

World: The Family Besieged,

US social critic Christopher

Lasch gives an anti-feminist

account of how traditional

family values are eroded in

the modern world.

1997 In Lesbian Lifestyles:

Women’s Work and the Politics

of Sexuality, British academic

Gillian Dunne argues that

lesbian relationships are

more egalitarian than

heterosexual partnerships.

2001 In Same Sex Intimacies:

Families of Choice and Other

Life Experiments, Jeffrey

Weeks and others state that

families are increasingly

becoming a matter of choice.