Family Matters
Subtitle: A History of Ideas About the Family Since 1945
Edition: 1st edition
Publisher: Longman
Published: February 13, 2002
Language: eng
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 200
ISBN-13: 9780582418707
Subjects: British & Irish history: postwar, from c 1945 -; Family & relationships; Postwar period, 1945 to c 2000; Social Science; Sociology; United Kingdom, Great Britain; General; Sociology - Marriage & Family; History / General
Description: "The family is now the subject of constant debate - private and public - in contemporary Europe. Family Matters is the first book to chart the history of family in Britain from the end of the Second World War to the beginning of the twenty-first century. The book traces the history of postwar debates and policy about family, and offers insights into the dramatically different current arguments about the family and gender relations. In the 1940s and 1950s ideas about the family were firmly rooted in nation and race. Subsequently, governments have been concerned about the fate of nuclear families while people's concerns often laid with the loosening of extended family ties. Family Matters points up the percurrent discrepancies between the 'official' version of the family and the actual more complicated experience of everyday life." "This is more than a simple history of family life, though. Taking an innovative approach, Family Matters works on three different levels: analysis of official policy and debate; the representation of family in popular culture, especially film; and the experience of family as remembered in a set of fresh oral histories." "Family Matters is vital reading for anyone who wants to understand the seismic changes in the shape of the family over the last 50 years."--BOOK JACKET.