When someone hears the word “family” most reminisce of holidays spent with siblings and parents, of opening presents and delicious meals, of blue-haired, cheek squeezing grandparents, and celebrations of life’s monuments. In Brenda Almond’s book The Fragmenting Family, “For many people, the most plausible starting point for any [family] analysis is biological…Biology makes a reasonable starting point for understanding the concept of a family simply because the family is a ubiquitous social institution” (9). In the traditional sense, “family” has meant a blood-related relative or a group of individuals brought together through marriage. Today this word carries several different meanings and carries various sociolinguistic insinuations. I consider …show more content…
For example, this could consist of siblings, parents, grandparents, cousins, uncles, aunts, and others. With the social foundation of marriage constantly evolving and changing, notions of a family are also destined to be ever changing. This created a different meaning for everyone. This would include families that have grown without relation to blood or marriage. This could be a family that grew through adoption; parents that love their adopted children as if they were their own flesh and blood. These “family” members could be their most beloved friends or even impending life partners. These unique and indestructible bonds created are possibly stronger than those shared by an immediate family. After much research some compelling information was established, “[Several] types of family networks were found, with an unequal emphasis on partners, children, siblings, blood relatives, and friends, … [people] develop a diversity of family networks beyond spouses and children” (Girardin, et al. 732). The general public should not choose who is to be considered family; it should be acknowledged and even encouraged for people to reflect on their best friends and companions as a family, even if they are not linked because of blood or
Family/pg. 442: two or more people who consider themselves related by blood, marriage, or adoption. The video showed how in Libby, Montana family is the number one priority. One of the men interviewed in the video, Les with asbestosis, showed a great example of this.
Jane Howard, a journalist who wrote about the changing American scene, in her essay “In Search of the Good Family” asserts that everyone needs a family which doesn’t necessarily mean it has to be blood-related. Howard progresses her argument by bringing in the terminology of an African tribe, her experience, and the characteristics which make up a good and conventional family. Therefore, Howard throughout her essay uses rhetorical appeals to make her argument credible. In this essay the author, Jane Howard, talks about the important role our friends play in our life and how they can become closer to you than your blood related family.
Family may not seem like a huge deal to some people and some generations, but there is not one simple definition of what family is. One can say that a family is a group of people that share a certain bond. During slavery, family meant everything, and family is all that the slaves had, unless their masters separated them because they knew family meant the world to the slaves. In the narrative of the life of Olaudah Equiano, Equiano’s bond with his sister was exceedingly cherished. In the narrative of Harriet Jacobs, Jacobs’ children was all she had.
Family More Than Just Blood People often assume that the definition of family is people who are bound by blood. However, people may consider someone of no relation to be family because of other factors that do not pertain to family trees. E.B. White’s short story “Once More to the Lake”, Gary Soto’s short story “One Last Time”, and Robert Hayden’s poem “Those Winter Sundays”, shows that family is not bound by blood but by shared memories, passed knowledge, and love. Memories are one of the most important aspects of a family.
What is ordinary? Ordinary could mean different things for different families or even different people. In the story “Ordinary People” written by Judith Guest. A family faces a challenge of a suicidal son and the loss of another son. A normal family would be portrayed as dad goes to work everyday to make money.
The love of a family is life’s greatest blessing. In life, there is a universal desire for oneness among people—we want to belong. It is why we collaborate, support common causes, cheer for sports teams, feel nationalism; it’s why we build villages, towns, and cities. Families are where we connect ourselves in relationships to past, current, and future generations. For many, family is not only a blessing, but our greatest accomplishment.
Families can be regarded as the foundation of society. For Fleetwood (2012: 1), the importance of families is highlighted by the fact that it would be difficult to comprehend a society that could function without them. In addition, even though families and their compositions vary across societies and cultures, the family can be viewed as a universal social institution (Macionis & Plummer, 2012: 625. Specifically, according to Macionis and Plummer (2012: 625) and Neale (2000:1), it has the ability to unite individuals into cooperative groups via social bonds (kinship) and is ultimately experienced differently from individual to individual. However, the family can be a source of conflict, tension and inequality, which is why one of the key practices
Families are said to constitute realities in which most of one’s attributes are constructed, based on the family interactions, beliefs, values as well as the behaviours that are seen in the specific families one is brought up into (Archer & McCarthy, 2007). However, even though most of one’s personal characteristics may be heavily influenced by their families; people do have a sense of individuality that makes them unique from any other person in the family (Becvar & Becvar, 2013). Therefore, one may argue that it is these differences that may cause misunderstandings in families.
Families have many different ways they could be defined. I would describe my family as being blended. My brother has a different father than me, and he is still considered family. This aspect is important in my concept of family because even if I do not talk to them everyday, I still have this connection where they will support the decisions that I want to make even if it is not an opinion that everyone agrees with. On the contrary, there is definitely diversity by having a blended family, especially since they have been a part of most of my life.
The family can be defined as ‘any combination of two or more persons who are bound together by ties of mutual consent, birth and/or adoption and who, together, accept responsibility for the care and maintenance of group members through procreation or adoption, the socialisation of children and social control of members’ (UN, cited in McDonald 2003:80). However, the ‘family’ is
Being a Communication Major, I have been exposed to the different types of family definitions out there, I have acquired the knowledge on why we define family the way we do and what the downsides are if we choose to define family in a narrow context but, when it comes to my definition of family I would stick to the structural definition of family which to me is, a family to me Is a group of tight-knitted community and individuals whom are related to one another through blood, legal means (marriage, adoptions) or personal relationships. Although my definition is really narrowed down and not inclusive, this definition works for me because I grew up in a family, in a community where the only people you regard as your family are those whom are related to you someway by blood. Growing up in my family and also in Nigeria, my family motto which eventually turned into my motto was “ Blood is Thicker than water” and that been said I and my siblings grew up with the mentality to choose family over friends or any other thing, which in turn led to us creating a boundary where we share things, secrets, do stuffs etc. but if you weren’t a family or meet any of the requirement that qualified you as a family you were shut out of the intricate part of family.
“Family” is a hard word to create a concrete definition for. If one were to ask three random people on the street, it is likely they will receive three completely different answers to defining a family. The textbook definition of family according to the etymology dictionary is: “Origin in early 15c. “servants of a household” from Latin familia “family servants, domestics collectively, the servants in a household.” The traditional dictionary describes family in a more narrow fashion stating, “a basic social unit consisting of parents and their children, considered as a group, whether dwelling together or not.”
Family is characterized with common aspects such as parents, grandparents, and siblings but there are so many other ways to distinct family. The word family is commonly defined as a group of individuals that have the same ancestors, and gather for holidays and other special events. This particular definition is true in so many ways, but everyone goes through life with situations that are brought up that bring together or break apart families. When I think about the word family and my experiences I have gone through and I would consider family to have crazy moments, lots of laughter, and unconditional love. Family to me is getting everyone together and having a good time and acting crazy with your loved ones, making memories.
According to Dictionary.com, family means a group of persons who form a household under one head, including parents, children, and servants. According to Google family means, all the descendants of a common ancestor. As one can see, there are many different meanings to family. To me family means support, dysfunctional, love, and friendships. Family is the most important influence on a child’s life.
Family members may or may not be biologically related, share the same household, or be legally recognized” (Raney, 2015:6). In the series Modern family, it shows the dynamics of a 21st century family and how traditions and culture has evolved over the years. As opposed to “nuclear family” “No longer does the traditional family consist of two parents and two children; instead, more diverse and shifting family structures are becoming the norm.