What is the term family? What does it mean? Who decides what makes up a family? The definition of family means "a set of relations especially parents and children"

(American Century Dictionary 205). This might include anyone related to by blood or by adoption such as: step parents, grandparents acting as parents, and even brothers and sisters sometimes sharing the same household.

The term family has been believed to coincide with the word "marriage". If you were to have a family, you were also thought to have a husband or wife. This was thought to be the norm for many centuries. This was named the "institutional family." But we have reinvented the word family. A family can consist of single parent family, step family, or a first marriage family. The role of the family is also a key concept in defining the family (Doherty 11).

"In all societies the first major agent of socialization for most individuals is the family"

(Thompson and Hickey 105). It is the nucleus of American life. The role of the American family is much the same as in any other country. Each family member has to fulfill his or her own part. Being a fat

11. Kramer, Peter. M.D. "Should We Leave?." Psychology Today. Sussex Publishers. September/October 1997: 38-48, 72, 74. Rpt. in Marriage and Family. Ed. Kathleen R Gilbert. Guilford, Connecticut. Dushkin/McGraw-Hill, 2000: 160.

Functionalists believe that power is the background of the whole theory. Power demonstrates authority but no one group (government, religious, or business) can dominate the entire system (Thompson and Hickey 482). In the family, a dominate powerful person, (mainly the male), can make the family into a learning, and cultural institution. Functionalism leaves no room to challenge this paternal power, because that would give rise to conflict. Conflict can then rise to spousal abuse or violence. Single parents can give more power to the children because they provide the power.

By view of the social structure, single parenting has changed the views of the way parents treat and raise their children. By definition, social structure is "the ordered relationships and patterned expectations that guide social interaction" (Thompson and Hickey 142). Even though there has been a decline in marriage, functionalism believes that the family is the foundation of social order. According to the sociologists Talcot Parsons, "any other type of family other than the nuclear family is dysfunctional in society because they are not suited for society's economic needs and therefore may be a potential threat to society" (2).

By way of the conflict perspective, conflict theorists view the family as an institution to which we will get all of our knowledge by determination of class. Conflict will acknowledge that all families have an important role in the development in a child's life, depending on the social class of that family. So the functional integration of the single parent family can exist in the conflict theory, but the determination of that child's outcome has its reliance on the social class from whence it came from (Mills 1).

But in Functionalism, I did not like the idea of how the patriarchal family should exist and how if there is violence in the family, we should ignore it? That it is only a micro problem of society? Then what would be considered a macro problem of society in functionalism?

4. Andersen, Margaret. Thinking about Women: Sociological Perspectives on Sex and Gender. 4th Edition Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1997.

10. Doherty, Williams J. Ph.D. "The Intentional Family How to Build Family Ties in Our Modern World." Addison-Wesley. 1997: 00/01. 3-16. Rpt. in Marriage and Family. Ed. Kathleen R Gilbert. Gulford, Connecticut. Dushkin/McGraw-Hill, 2000 . 11-16.

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