Parsons And The American Family Summary

1. Present Parsons concepts of roles and norms and their relation to the raising of children.
- Background Introduction -
As introduced by Parsons (1956/1968), over the course of time, the American family has undergone a “profound process of change” (p.3) especially post-war. This structural societal metamorphosis can be seen in some of the more recent trends outlined by the author, such as divorce rates and birth rates, both results linked to an apparent and observed “loss of function of the family” (Parsons, 1956/1968, p.3). The aforementioned loss of familial function has been linked to both the newly acquired outsourcing of internal familial jobs (such as the provision of clothing), the “disorganization of transition” (Parsons, 1956/1968, p.5), and the deficit of housing facilities post World War II, which was said to be “bringing the imminent race suicide in its wake” (Parsons, 1956/1968, p.6-7) and therefore reducing the overall birth rate of the American population up until the mid-thirties.
-Parsons and the American Family -
The author outlines some of the elements that in his opinion and according to his observations, make up the

As Parsons (1956/1968) reads: “the primary function and characteristic of the family is that it should be a social group in which in the earliest stages the child can invest all of his emotional resources, to which he can become overwhelmingly committed or on which he can become fully dependent. […] This dependency must be temporary rather than permanent [as it is] very important that the socializing agents should not themselves be too completely immersed in their family ties. It is a condition […] that a family should, in due course, help in emancipating the child from his dependency on the family”