The Sociology of Personal Life
- Created by: eviedeehan
- Created on: 14-02-24 12:38
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- The Sociology of Personal Life
- takes an interactionist approach to the family
- focuses on the meaning people give to the intimate experiences and relationships that form personal lives such as sex, emotional intimacy and memories
- people have more choice in how they decide to live their lives - modern families differ from nuclear
- individualisation thesis - attributed to postmodern theorists such as Beck and Giddens
- traditional rules that govern personal relationships have weakened and are unclear therefore losing influence
- as a consequence relationships are influenced by self-interest and love rather than practical necessity - long term relationships are no longer enforced by external standards of parents and kin
- people no longer stay together regardless of how well their relationship is going - replaced by confluence love based on pure relationships underpinned by personal trust and friendship
- critisms
- Smart - individualisation thesis exaggerates the extent of family decline - still influenced by social class, gender etc
- the family is more diverse but not declining
- all personal relationships contribute to the formation of identity, people remain in long term relationships based on bonds, shared possessions etc that have meaning
- suggests people give meaning to the family, structural theories argue that they are conventional definitions
- takes an interactionist approach to the family
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