History of the family
The history of the family follows complex sociocultural evolution of kinship from prehistoric to modern times. Family studies aim to understand the structure and function of the family in various contexts and represent the interrelationship between individuals their relatives and the historical time. [1]. Societies are organized on the basis of kin selection, reciprocity and coercion and even non-kin based systems like states and businesses use the concept of family organization to increase credibility and induce cooperation. [2] The human family systems are flexible, culturally diverse and adaptive to ecological and economical conditions.[3]
Emergence of historical studies of the family
Henry Morgan published Ancient Society in 1877 based on theory of the three stages of human progress from Savagery through Barbarism to Civilization. This in turn was the inspiration for Friedrich Engels book The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State published in 1884. Engels expanded the scope of Morgan's interest including the disintegration of the primitive community and the emergence of a class society based on private property [1]. The 1960 book by Philippe Ariès Centuries of Childhood sparked new interest in the history of the family studies. Ariès conceptualized childhood as a modern invention that emerged in conjugal family when the role of the family changed to become more private. [4]
Ancient Perspective
In Western culture the earliest accounts of family history were creation stories. In ancient Greek tradition Hesiod in his Works and Days poem traces the lineage of the mankind through five successive stages from the Golden Age to the present Iron Age. Hesiod's Theogony contains genealogy of the family of Greek Gods and reflects the ancient polytheist worldview. In the Bible the account of Judeo-Christian creation story is in the Book of Genesis and the genealogy is shown in patrilinear tradition from first men Adam to Noah, from Noah to Abraham, from Abraham to David and from David to Jesus and the Holy Family. The Bible often references to the practice of polygamy with the Hebrew scriptures documenting some forty polygamist families. Many modern family legal concepts were codified under the roman law. In the Roman times, the family would include everyone within a household under the authoritarian role of the father, the pater familias, and included grown children and the slaves of the household.[2]
Methodology of the family studies
Family reconstitution by analysis of demographic records, census, will, court and church files, architectural and archeological evidence, art and iconography, food production and material culture.
Changes in western post-industrial family
The pre- industrial family regulated reproduction, socialization, education, religious observance, production, landholding and inheritance. In the absence of government institutions the family was also a resource to cope with sickness and aging. Social roles and political action and any effective membership in a society was attainable only through a claim to a family.[5] Families were larger then and included non-relatives, like servants, apprentices and boarders.[6] In nineteenth and twentieth-century family played a central role in assisting the migration of its members form rural areas to industrial cities and helping to organize new living places and adapting to the new work conditions.[7]
See also
Notes
References
- Hareven, Tamara K. 1991 The History of the Family and the Complexity of Social Change. American Historical Association.
- van den Berghe, Pierre 1979 Human family systems: an evolutionary view. Elsevier North Holland, Inc.
- The Marxists Internet Archive "Works of Frederick Engels 1884"
- The Illustrated History of the Roman Empire "Roman Society, Roman Life"
- Wrigley, E. Anthony 1977 Reflections on the History of the Family. The MIT Press.