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Changing Family Structures

Article: The age of family diversity? Julian Salisbury, Sociology Review, Volume 30, 2020/21, Issue 2

Questions

• Traditional family arrangements and sexual relationships have changed over time. But by how much, and is this about choice or other factors?
• In the 1950s, functionalist sociologists such as Murdock and Parsons argued that the traditional isolated nuclear family of a male ‘breadwinner’ married to a female ‘homemaker’ caring for their offspring is the most functional and efficient family form for individuals and society alike. This is because it serves to socialize children and stabilize adult personalities at the same time as allowing geographical and social mobility in industrialized societies better than any other family arrangements that may involve extended kin. Whilst family forms are more diverse today, New Right theorists argue that the isolated nuclear family remains the ‘ideal’ or preferred family model that most people will live in at some time in their lives. Is it the ‘ideal’ family model and was it ever the ‘ideal’ family model?
• In the book Working for Ford (1973), the sociologist Huw Beynon observed workers on the production line at Ford’s Halewood plant near Liverpool wasting their lives away, boringly repeating the same operation every 36 seconds, day in, day out. He asked one worker, ‘why don’t you just blow this f**king place up?’ The worker replied, ‘When I have those thoughts, I close my eyes and think of the wife and kids’. The employment policy of the Ford Motor Company was always to employ family men rather than single men whenever possible. What would Marxists argue is the main role of what they call ‘the bourgeois family’ in capitalist societies?
• To what extent are the feminist criticisms of the traditional nuclear family valid?
• To what extent do we have the kind of choices that postmodernists suggest we do in the types of families that we live in today?
• Is the ‘beanpole’ family really something new or is it just new to the middle-class? N.B. My wife and I both come from the East End of London, where for much of the 20th century the extended family was extremely important as an economic, social and cultural resource for working-class families. See in particular the studies by Young and Wilmott entitled Family and Kinship in East London (1957) and Family and Class in a London Suburb (1960) that validate this personal experience.
• In early Victorian Britain, the number of divorces averaged out at just three a year. Now, more than 40% of marriages end in divorce. Clearly, divorce is a consequence of individual choice, but what structural factors have played a part in this dramatic rise?

Changing Family Structures

Article: The age of family diversity? Julian Salisbury, Sociology Review, Volume 30, 2020/21, Issue 2 (continued from session 1)

Questions

• Traditional family arrangements and sexual relationships have changed over time. But by how much, and is this about choice or other factors?
• The Family lives of young, disadvantaged fathers, Louisa Donald, Sociology Review, Volume 34, 2024/25, Issue 2
• To what extent are today’s ‘reconstituted’ or ‘blended families’ a consequence of individual choice or structural circumstances?
• What do you think are the main causes of the increasing number of ‘lone-person and lone-parent households’?
• What is the ‘gender contract’, to what extent do you think this ‘contract’ is changing and what are the causes of these changes?
• Is ‘confluent love’ a consequence of greater individual choice in the postmodern world or are there structural forces at play that are causing this major change in personal relationships?
• To what extent are social class and ethnicity important variables in forming family relationships today compared to the past?
• The article mentions that in 1988, under Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government, ‘…Clause 28 of the Local Government Act prohibited the teaching or promotion of homosexuality’, making the teaching of PSE almost impossible for teachers. A speaker at the party’s annual conference told cheering delegates that ‘if you want a queer for your neighbour, vote Labour.’ The Conservative leader of Staffordshire County Council advocated tackling AIDS by gassing homosexuals and one of Margaret Thatcher’s MPs, Elaine Kellett-Bowman, approved in Parliament of an arson attack on the offices of Capital Gay, saying ‘there should be an intolerance of evil.’ Two weeks later she was made a Dame on Margaret Thatcher’s recommendation. Margaret Thatcher also said at the annual conference of the Conservative Party that, ‘families headed by lesbians and gay men could never be anything but “pretend” families.’ Was she right? If not, what does this tell us about the permanence or otherwise of society’s norms and values with regard to family forms?
• Are there any other issues with regard to the article or, indeed, with regard to family diversity more generally that you wish to discuss?
• The article was based on an analysis of qualitative data from in-depth interviews with young, disadvantaged fathers. What are the advantages and disadvantages of using in-depth interviews in sociological research?
• To what extent are the fathers’ behaviours in the study a consequence of social action and to what extent are their behaviours a consequence of structural constraints?

Social effects of digital media

Article: Media Influence in a Digital World, Catherine Happer, Sociology, Review Vol. 34 No. 2, November, 2024

Questions

• With traditional mass media such as television and newspapers to what extent were/are encoded messages decoded in ways that media moguls intend(ed)?
• Modes of engagement – Which ‘mode of engagement’ with social media do you tend to employ (holistic, decentred or centred) and why?
• Ideology – What ‘common sense’ or hegemonic ideas serve the interests of the powerful and to what extent are they challenged or simply reproduced on social media?
• Priorities and value systems – Other than the examples given by Happer, can you give an example of prioritisation, or ‘agenda-setting’ as it is sometimes called?
• Interpersonal communities – Teachers in Britain have recently been reporting that despite their efforts on an interpersonal level to instil in boys the need to show respect for their female peers, they feel that they are often fighting a losing battle with hugely popular social media ‘influencers’ such as Andrew Tate. To what extent can interpersonal communities (parents, teachers etc.) compete with such social media commentators for influence?
• Identity and alignment – To what extent do you align yourself only with groups you identify with on social media?
• Lived experience – To what extent is lived experience more important in framing opinions, attitudes and values than social media? Does it depend on the issue(s) and the extent to which an individual uses social media?
• The Covid-19 pandemic provides a good example of Happer’s ‘six filters’ model, especially with regard to how the government tried to control the narrative around the pandemic. The government are currently consulting on the possibility of introducing new mechanisms for controlling thought and opinion online. To what extent do you agree that such controls are needed? E.g. restricting access for young people to videos on jihadism or on how to commit suicide.
• In line with Donald Trump’s stance on reducing censorship and promoting more political content on social media, CEOs of tech giants like Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk have recently suspended fact-checking programmes and reduced censorship on their platforms. Is this a good or bad thing?

Gender equality

Article: How do we explain the gender pay gap?,Joan Garrod, Sociology Review, Vol. 30 No. 2, November 2020

Questions

• Why are there so few young women studying STEM subjects (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) and entering careers in STEM subjects?
• Social class, gender and glass ceilings in politics. This article suggests reasons why it is especially difficult for working-class women to become politicians.
• What are some of the reasons why occupations with a high proportion of women in the workforce tend to have lower salary levels than more mixed or male-dominated ones?
• What reasons might there be for women increasing their hours of paid employment and decreasing their unpaid hours?
• Why should the case for men (at least in higher income families) be different?
• What reasons might there be for boys to be more ambitious than girls in their higher education plans? What could (or should) be done about this?

Gender

Article: Why we need more women in STEM subjects, Emma Smith, Sociology Review, Vol.34, No.3, February 2025

• What do you think are the most important reasons why young women who study science subjects are more likely to choose psychology or medical sciences rather than engineering, computer science, maths or physics?
• What do you think are the main barriers for women wanting to work in traditionally male-dominated STEM occupations and what do you think about the various organisations that are attempting to overcome these barriers?

Class and gender

Article: Social Class, gender and glass ceilings in politics, Rainbow Murray, Sociology Review, Vol.34, No.3, February 2025

Questions

• Snowball sampling’ in social research is often criticised for producing samples that are unrepresentative of the population that one is trying to say something about. What are your thoughts on this with regard to this particular piece of research?
• What are the main barriers/disincentives to working-class candidates, especially female working-class candidates to seeking election to parliament?
• What measures do you think could be taken to improve the chances of working- class candidates, especially female working-class candidates getting elected to parliament?

Sociological Theory

Article: Symbolic Interactionism: The Forgotten Perspective? by Martin Holborn, Sociology Review Volume 34 No. 4, April 2025

Questions

• Holborn says that symbolic interactionists suggest that ‘the individual and society are mutually constitutive’ and that ‘… society is a negotiated order’ (p. 25). To what extent do you think that this is the case?
• If ‘society’ is a ‘negotiated order’, then why do actors often find it difficult, and sometimes impossible, to shake off labels that are applied to them; particularly if they are negative labels?
• In her research, Susie Scott used ‘shyness’ (pp. 26-27) to illustrate her symbolic interactionist approach to social life. Can you think of other areas of social life that could be researched and theorised in a similar way?
• Using Goffman’s dramaturgical model, think about a visit to your GP (If you can get to see one!). While waiting in the waiting room, how does your backstage rehearsal go and when you get to see her/him, what is particular about the
• impression management that both parties are attempting to employ? Goffman spent two years as a participant observer working in a mental health institution watching interaction between patients and staff while working. This formed the basis of his book ‘Asylums’ (1961). How do you think the staff related to patients and how do you think the patients reacted? Clue: ‘The looking glass self’

Education

Article: Cycles of privilege in education by Ewan Hawkins, Sociology Review, Volume 34, No. 1, September 2024

Questions

Consider the following points that are mentioned in the article:

• The importance of economic capital.
• Differential resourcing of schools.
• Differential educational outcomes between state and independent schools.
• Differential access to elite Higher Educational institutions.
• Differential incomes between those who went to state and those who went to independent schools.
• Privileged access to certain occupations.
• Segregation of students within and between schools.
• Social capital through social networks.
• Cultural capital in the form of imperial values.
• The production of ‘an ethnically diverse, transnational elite class’ by independent schools.
• Do these issues need addressing and if so, how?

Research Methods

Article: Research methods: A quantitative/qualitative trade-off?, Jack Fawbert, Sociological Review, Volume 35, No. 1, September 2025

Questions

• Because positivists and interpretivists start from different theoretical standpoints with regard to what ‘society’ is and how it works, discuss to what extent quantitative and qualitative approaches to research are ‘incommensurate paradigms’.
• Is methodological triangulation illegitimate? Use the examples in the text or others if you prefer.
• In view of the fact that nobody was harmed in any way by his research and the fact that it provided us with an understanding of a topic that we otherwise would bevery much in the dark about, do you think that Humphreys’ methodology was acceptable? If not, why not?

Religion

Article: Is Football a Religion?, Jack Fawbert, Sociology Review,Vol. 30, No. 2, November, 2020

Questions

• How would you define ‘religion’?
• How many of the six dimensions that I identify in ‘Box 1’ in the article would you say are consistent with identifying a practice as a ‘religion’? Are there others that you might identify?
• On the basis of the article, would you class football as a ‘religion’?

Religion

Article: The return of religion and the rise of spirituality? Martin Holborn, Sociology Review, Vol.35 No.2, November, 2025

Questions

• Comparing the ideas of Marx and Weber, what was/is the role of Christianity in the development of Western industrial capitalist societies?
• To what extent has the development of a rational capitalist zeitgeist led to a demystification and disenchantment with the social world?
• Is a ‘scientific’ and rational demystification of the world a good or a bad thing?
• As sociologists, how would we go about measuring the extent of secularization, demystification and disenchantment?
• How do we explain what’s called ‘American exceptionalism’?