Gender and Family Write an account on the functionalist, Marxist and Feminist views of the family and explain the key differences and similarities of the three approaches. Sociological perspective is the way of looking at the society. Sociological perspective are essentially similar, in that they are different viewpoints from which sociologists examine society. Sociological perspectives have a very big impact in the way family are. Functionalist emphasizes the positive role of the family. They see every institution in society as essential to the smooth running of society. Functionalist are interested in the contribution the family makes to satisfying the functional prerequisite or basic needs, which enable society to survive, and how the family ‘fits’ with other social institutions. A key functional study by Murdock (1949) concluded that the family is so useful to society that is inequitable and universal. Murdock stated that: ‘No society ... has succeeded in finding on adequate substitute for the nuclear family... It is highly doubtful whether any society will succeed in such an attempt’ (Murdock,G.P 1949) Social Structure, Macmillan, New York). Murdock argued that some form of the nuclear family existed in all of the 250 different societies he looked at across the world. He argued the family performed four basic functions: sexual, which means freedoms for sexual gratification within legal and moral rules in that society. Reproductive, producing the next generation. Economic, which mean division of labor in the family between the husband and the wife or the two adults; and Educational socializing and educating family member for their role in the future In the 1950s, American sociologist Talcon Parsons argued that the family always has two basic and irreducible functions. These are the primary socialization of the children and the stabilization of adult personalities. In Parson’s view, women have an expressive role in the family, providing warmth, security and emotional support to their children and male partner. The male partner carries out an instrumental role as family bread winner, which leads to stress and anxiety and threatens to destabilize his personality. Roald Fletcher was a strong supporter of the family, he argued that institutions had improved the family and the lifestyle has changed. Goode, he argued that nuclear family provide freedoms and economic, also a high rate of mobility. However he argued that extended families still exist but there are likely to be in upper classes. (K.Brown 3ed.) Marxist it was created by Karl Marx, who lived his life from the years of 1818 to 1883 and explains how family contributes to the sustenance of the society’s structure. Marxists see the family as meeting the needs of capitalist system. Marxist not much differences from the functionalist, see the family as a way to carry out functions for the modern industrial society. On a main difference is that the Marxist believes that the family .

1. Gender and Family
Write an account on the functionalist, Marxist and Feminist
views of the family and explain the key differences and
similarities of the three approaches.
Sociological perspective is the way of looking at the society.
Sociological perspective are essentially similar, in that they are
different viewpoints from which sociologists examine society.
Sociological perspectives have a very big impact in the way
family are.
Functionalist emphasizes the positive role of the family. They
see every institution in society as essential to the smooth
running of society. Functionalist are interested in the
contribution the family makes to satisfying the functional
prerequisite or basic needs, which enable society to survive,
and how the family ‘fits’ with other social institutions. A key
functional study by Murdock (1949) concluded that the family
is so useful to society that is inequitable and universal.
Murdock stated that:
‘No society ... has succeeded in finding on adequate substitute
for the nuclear family... It is highly doubtful whether any
society will succeed in such an attempt’ (Murdock,G.P 1949)
Social Structure, Macmillan, New York).
Murdock argued that some form of the nuclear family existed in
all of the 250 different societies he looked at across the world.
He argued the family performed four basic functions: sexual,
which means freedoms for sexual gratification within legal and
moral rules in that society. Reproductive, producing the next
generation. Economic, which mean division of labor in the
family between the husband and the wife or the two adults; and
Educational socializing and educating family member for their
role in the future

2. In the 1950s, American sociologist Talcon Parsons argued that
the family always has two basic and irreducible functions.
These are the primary socialization of the children and the
stabilization of adult personalities. In Parson’s view, women
have an expressive role in the family, providing warmth,
security and emotional support to their children and male
partner. The male partner carries out an instrumental role as
family bread winner, which leads to stress and anxiety and
threatens to destabilize his personality. Roald Fletcher was a
strong supporter of the family, he argued that institutions had
improved the family and the lifestyle has changed. Goode, he
argued that nuclear family provide freedoms and economic, also
a high rate of mobility. However he argued that extended
families still exist but there are likely to be in upper classes.
(K.Brown 3ed.)
Marxist it was created by Karl Marx, who lived his life from the
years of 1818 to 1883 and explains how family contributes to
the sustenance of the society’s structure. Marxists see the
family as meeting the needs of capitalist system. Marxist not
much differences from the functionalist, see the family as a way
to carry out functions for the modern industrial society. On a
main difference is that the Marxist believes that the family
favor the minority in power called ''the bourgeoisie'' and the
economy, but disfavor the working class majority called
''proletariat''.
Engels (1884) sees the family as an economic function, by
keeping the wealth of the bourgeoisie by passing on to next
generations as inheritance. Zarestky (1976) emphasize more on
how family contributes in the capitalist economy. He argued
that the family is the place where the proletariat can have power
and control. When the proletariat gets home, he's the head of
the house therefore this relieves some of the frustrations
workers feel about their law class status, which help them

3. accept their oppression and exploits as workers.
In the other hand we have the Feminist approach which says
that the Marxist approach concentrates on the exploitation of
working class and not on the women. There are different types
of feminist; such as Liberal Feminism, Socialist Feminism,
Radical Feminism, and these are the three types of feminist out
of the list we are going to look at. (Palgrave journals) access
2013.
Liberal Feminism, they do not see women being under men’s
control as part of a structure, rather they emphasise the
inequalities between men and woman; they are more concern on
the sexism and discrimination carry out on the workplace. They
fight to keep equal opportunities for women through bringing
about reforms progressively.
Socialist feminism, who fights to withdrawn patriarchy and
capitalism system in society. According to Frederick Engels
under capitalism, material and economic factors are the main
reasons for the women’s dependence of men, because patriarchy
is originated in private property
Radical Feminist group, they believe that the main cause of
women oppression is in the family. According to their view men
take advantage on women through ‘domestic labour’ done by
them at no cost. (K.Brown 3ed.)Explain the Marxist and
Feminist approaches to the study of the family.
Role of Socialization and Patriarchy
Feminist approach believes the family exploits and oppresses
the woman by maintaining the existing social order. They
classify the existing social order as patriarchy, which is a
combined system with ideologies and cultural practices which
give the men an absolute power. Feminist theory argues that the
family supports and creates inequalities between men and
women. (K.Brown 3ed.)
The approach Marxist and Feminists have towards the study of

4. families are very similar yet very different. The main difference
lies that that feminists see women as the ones that are being
treated unfairly while Marxists see the society as being treated
unequal and oppressed which is of the proleriat and bourgeosie.
From the perspective of a Feminist view, the society shows a lot
of favour to men and they are viewed as the key holder to
success, wealth and recognition whereby a woman is looked on
as weak, unimportant and crippled. A lot of Feminist writers
have debates about how the society gives a lot of importance
and relevance to men versus women. They claim that the society
is patriarchal – a society where man is the main dominance
among women. The major assumption feminists have is that
women have to suffer from unfair treatment due to their gender.
This ties in with family because feminists believed that women
are secondhand in the household. A lot of the times women are
seen to be cooking and living a life behind the doors of a man.
This type of treatment creates an inequality relationship
between the man and the woman because the woman is forced to
be dependent on the man and believe he is the source of
strength and tranquility. Feminists state confidently that
marriage is patriarchal stating that the husbands benefit from
the wives. Questions will arise about the existence of patriarchy
and Kate Millet, who was one of the first feminists to use the
term “patriarchy”, did a great job explaining her opinion on
what cause this. She claims that the existence of patriarchy
comes from eight factors: (earlhamsociologypages.co.uk)
Men are taught to be dominant and to act in a way which
emphasize that there is a major distinction between a man and a
woman in terms of gender and power; biology is a factor.
Men are socialized to contain dominant characteristics that
creates them to have a higher status versus a woman. Family is
the main reason patriarchy exists because it spreads across the
family, influencing the children and going across various
generations. Women will always be subordinate to men; caste-

5. like system with women are looked downer compared to men.
Women get treated unfairly when it comes to pay and compared
to men, the paid work women perform are usually meaningless
when it comes to status. Men retain power from myth and
religion; using God as a reason to make patriarchy correct and
ethically acceptable. Women find themselves inferior to men.
Men contain physical power compared to women.
Marxists argues that family depends solely for the benefit of a
capitalist system. Marx believed that capitalism can only thrive
on the exploitation of the working class and he also believed
that there was a real contradiction between human nature and
the way that we must work in a capitalist society. Marxists state
that families are shaped by what the capitalism serves within
the society. Without any family, there would be no economy.
(H.Collins,2001)Explain the difference between segregated and
integrated roles in the family.Segregated and Integrated
Families
Every family has some type of structure and though every
family is not the same, there is an idea or stereotype of how a
family is supposed to be. When a family is participating in a
segregated act, it is when they have no bond or spend any time
together. The father is usually known to be the one who brings
money to the house. He goes to work, doing a 9-5, he usually
doesn’t care to ask about the children or even assist with the
daily chores of the house. While the wife is the one who cooks,
takes care of the children and actually performs the daily house
chores. This type of family structure shows there is not much
socialization between the members of the family, which can
create critical problems between the husband and the wife.
Problems like divorce, fighting and disagreements may occur
when a family is structured this way. (biracialfamilies.org)
In comparison, an integrated family is the total opposite of a
segregated family. It is when the father participates

6. overwhelmingly in the family activities, like cooking, playing
with the children, helping with their homework and actually
being united with the whole family. Both couples take leisure
time together which shows a healthy structure and ideally
should be the way every family should be.
However, in this generation and especially in the 21st century,
things aren’t according to the rules anymore and more and more
families aren’t playing the traditional role that we have been
brought up with. Gone are the days when wives were forbidden
to work or the days when husbands weren’t looked on as crazy
if they cooked dinner for the house.( sociology.org.uk/)
This case study is an example of how role is reversed where the
husband the primary role.
Case Study:
An article written by The Telegraph supports this idea as it
explains the popular emergence of house husbands in the UK
which is something so contrary to the idea that men should
never be playing the role of a wife. This article explains about
how a mother takes off to work before her children start
preparing for school and how the father is the one helping the
Children get ready. This idea causes a lot of controversy from a
sociological perspective as some may say it can cause a
disturbance in a family structure. Perhaps the husband may lose
sight of what his role really stands for. Nevertheless, it must be
said that in a time like this where our generation is battling
recession and many people are losing their jobs and a time
where we have so much problems burning within the society,
things can’t be the way it is supposed to be. A twist in a family
structure is practically normal as a family has to adjust to the
roller coasters of life. (The Telegraph, 2009)

8. References:
Brown, K (2005) Introduction sociology foe AS Level, 2nd Ed,
Polity Press.
H. Collins (2001) Haralambos, Holborn.
http://www.earlhamsociologypages.co.uk/Varieties%20of%20fe
minism.html
http://www.sociology.org.uk/sc_shop_pdf/sc_AS4AQA_educate
_e.pdf
Bibliography:
http://www.diaryof1.com/2008/03/05/an-integrated-family-in-a-
segregated-world/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/bradford/hi/people_and_places/news
id_8810000/8810779.stm
http://biracialfamilies.org/integrated-home-segregated-world/
Brown, K (2005) Introduction sociology foe AS Level, 2nd Ed,
Polity Press.
H. Collins (2001) Haralambos, Holborn.
http://www.earlhamsociologypages.co.uk/Varieties%20of%20fe
minism.html
http://www.sociology.org.uk/sc_shop_pdf/sc_AS4AQA_educate
_e.pdf