Handbook of contemporary families: Considering the past, contemplating the future

Handbook of Contemporary Families: Considering the Past, Contemplating the Future. Marilyn Coleman & Lawrence H. Ganong (Eds.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. 2004. 640 pp. ISBN 0-7619-2713-1. $125.00 (hardcover). The editors of the Handbook of Contemporary Families have compiled a comprehensive, well-written, and well-organized volume addressing what is currently known about marriages and families and the changes that they have undergone over the past 30 years. An impressive group of interdisciplinary contributors tackle a wide range of subjects-from the traditional to the diverse to the truly esoteric and rarely studied-in state-of-the-art reviews that contribute both breadth and depth of knowledge. Beginning with demographic data, most chapters lay out for the reader how each area has developed over the past three decades, the current state of knowledge, conceptual and methodological approaches used to study the topic, and bridges between research and application. Most authors evaluate to what effect theories and research methods have been used to increase scholars' and practitioners' knowledge about family diversity, point out existing gaps in the literature, and conclude with their thoughts on directions for future scholarship. Some authors state specific research questions that need to be addressed; others point to more general goals. Overall, the chapters differ from many of the reviews published in the Journal of Marriage and the Family "Decade in Review" in 2000 (Vol. 62, No. 4) in terms of topic and content, and thus supplement rather than replace those works. Several of the chapters on topics that have yet to find their place in mainstream social science research make fine contributions to a book on contemporary, diverse families. The handbook consists of 31 chapters divided into nine major subject areas. The three chapters in Part One, Considering the Past, Contemplating the Future, provide an overview of family scholarship. In the first chapter, John Scanzoni discusses diversity in households and the reactions of professionals studying this topic over the past 40 years. Roger H. Rubin follows with "Alternative Lifestyles Today: Off the Family Studies Screen," a chapter on "swinging" or comarital sex, group marriages, and communes. The third chapter, by Steven Mintz, reviews how "The Social and Cultural Construction of American Childhood" has changed over the past 400 years in terms of (a) "the timing, sequence, and stages of growing up" (37), (b) demographic changes, such as the reduction in birth rate, which resulted in more intense attention to children's needs, (c) the shift from child work to child schooling, and (d) adults' attitudes toward childhood. Part Two, Contemporary Couples, includes chapters on cohabiting (Judith Seltzer); gay and lesbian (Lawrence Kurdek), childless or child-free (Richard Bulcroft & Jay Teachman), and later life relationships (Teresa Cooney & Kathleen Dunne); and a chapter on "Variations in Marriage Over Time" (Ronald Sabatelli & Karen Ripoll). In this latter chapter, Sabatelli and Ripoll introduce an ecological/exchange framework to make the case that experiences in marriage and variations in marriage over time are to some extent the result of changes outside marriage that make marriage appear less rewarding. Thus, rather than attempting to strengthen marriages by making it more difficult or costly for spouses to obtain a divorce, the authors argue that researchers and practitioners need to realize that marriages should be strengthened by increasing its attractiveness or quality. Parts Three and Four, Gender Issues in Contemporary Families and Raising Children in Contemporary Families, include chapters on balancing work, marriage, and parenthood in dual-earner couples (Maureen Perry-Jenkins & Elizabeth Turner); gendered family relationships (Lori McGraw & Alexis Walker); a vision for transforming families from a feminist point of view (Katherine Allen); and reviews of scholarship on motherhood (Susan Walzer), fatherhood (Scott Coltrane), and pathogenic-conflict couples and their effects on children (W. …