Family Theory and Postmodernism
Introduction
Sociologists consider the family as a universal institution in the society of human beings. It is an essential element, a part of the fundamental realities. As the community or society nature of a man, a family is a seed of understanding and describing reality. Berger (2017) engages the work of BALAN (2016) in showing how postmodernism has affected family structure and family therapy. Being a universal institution, a family is specific for any society. In the postmodern world, the family is featured by aspects that make it impossible to solve them by itself. In the nuclear family, an individual chooses a partner based on freedom of choice and affection, to ensure mutual happiness of the couple. In the modern couple, there is freedom of choice, with love as the primary criterion, and the individuals exercise their right to individual development. Marriage problems may strongly affect the individuals, and cause adverse conditions of anxiety, depression, sadness and tension. Regardless of the issues that the couple face at times, the family has shown to be a rationale and dominant social organization. Changes that have brought by postmodernism do not bring an alternative for replacing the family, but they have modified some features of the existing family structure.
Background
BALAN (2016) defines postmodernism as a tactic that describes the progress of society to a period beyond modernity. During this period, people place more significance on rational thought and science because traditional fictions no longer offer a descriptive explanation for life in the postmodern era. Also, the experience of globalization in postmodern society causes the integration of new religions into the community. Theories of postmodernism state that family life in the postmodern era consists of variation, diversity and instability. With choice as a central aspect in the culture of the west, the rising diversity in family life reflects this choice. Besides, the variety and choice have created negotiations in family relationships as individuals try to look for a central ground between commitment to other people (children and their partners), and individualization. Individualization emerges from different factors, such as secularization and urbanization.
Today’s family structures and relationships are experiencing breakdowns in traditions and meanings. Hence, with relation to the life of a family, many sociologists have argued that society has reached the point where the practice patterns and values of the behaviour of the modern family have no widespread currency any longer. Many individuals are no longer content, or discontentedly willing to comply with the customs defining conjugal role patterns, parental mores, or marriage. Also, these people are no longer content to restrain themselves within the traditional structures of conformist extended or nuclear obligations of the family, and continuities of residence. Step relationships, single-person households, lone parenting, unmarried cohabitation, and lasting co-residential non-heterosexual relationships have developed to ne familiar patterns of domestic life.
According to Borcsa & Stratton (2016), nuclear family in America where two parents take care of kids in an emotionally and protective, secure environment is not the norm anymore. The family is a term used in speeches every day. People use it to refer to bonds in which people trust involve lasting intimate relations. However, these beliefs or relationships do not adhere to a universal pattern or form. The postmodernist argument goes beyond this. As Becvar & Becvar (2017) states in their book, the situations of families in modern society are so diverse and varied that speaking of one ideal model of a family doesn’t make any sociological sense. Adams & Manning (2015) regards the term ‘family’ to be imparted with emotions and values of ordinary people that suggests entirely dispensing the word for purposes of scientific reasoning.
Family in the postmodern period faces a constellation of situations and issues that make it unable to elucidate them by itself. As an adult couple, the family lives the complex drama of relational, cultural and economic situations of the present time. A family is a group of people building together traditions, social values, and their culture. It is pressured by issues regarding economic recession, a crisis of religion, and difficulties in interpersonal communication. Ironically, an increase in the perfection of mass communication has led to a rise in the lack of interpersonal communication, particularly on socio-affective relationships. Hence, there is a need to generally optimizing peoples’ relationships, techniques of negotiation, communication, collaboration and cooperation.
Analysis
Selecting a lifetime partner has a substantial effect on the future. Connecting two different lives, may with contrasting ways of living, form a unique lifestyle in which the couple will live together. If love disappears from the couple, the conjugal partnership losses its meaning. Most people believe that the high rates of divorce are due to the choice of partner after a preeminent criterion. It is affection and passionate love. Since in the beginning, marriage has been linked with balance, morality, stability and harmony. In contrast, the view is divorce. This bipolar discernment indicates its current limits.
Contemporary life has an accelerated pace that requires human beings to quickly adjust to constantly changing situations, which makes people very busy. In this context, significant changes have occurred in family life. Even specialists have begun understanding the term family more extensively compared to the groups consisting of children and their parents (BALAN, 2016). Specialists are taking into account the extent of the private group, and kinship, among others. They are defining a family group by cohabitation, the presence of children, and ordinary residence. Therefore, a family is not just a unit of socio-emotions but a group of people characterized by conflicts and tensions.
Sometimes ago, marriages could last until one of the partners dies. However, this has changed. In recent times, divorce rates have increased, a dissolution that causes financial difficulties and emotional disorders. Though it is evident that most marriages fail terribly, most individuals enter into marriage relationships with the desire and purpose of making it last. The two have faith that they would always stick together. Often, there is a flawless fit between their lifestyle, interests and attitudes. Unluckily, this is misleading. The relationship is never the same after a month, a decade, or even a week. Men possess an instrumental role that takes them to the sphere of waged employment. On the contrary, women possess and expressive duty that makes them care for the private fields of children and home. With this, people can conclude that traditional values still exist in the family, and the much variation and diversity argued by postmodernists do not exist.
People are currently living in an environment where diversity and choice define them, and there is an increase in the chances of selecting a lifestyle and choosing an identity. Besides, they enjoy the greater freedom of constructing their domestic plan. This period is also referred to as late modernity. Diversity in a family reflects the priorities and opportunities of late modernity.