SCFF 5005 Interdisciplinary Study of the Family

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Syllabus and Required Readings

Introduction

9/7	Productivity, improvisation, history. The many voices of "family." The nature of culture.

• Lévi-Strauss, Claude "Nature and culture" Chapter 1 of The elementary structures of kinship. Tr. by J. Bell and J. von Sturmer. Boston: Beacon Press. 1969 [1947].

[recommended: You may also want to read through Chapter 7.]

9/14 The sociological sense.

• Parsons, Talcott "The American family: Its relations to personality and to the social structure."; In Family, socialization and interaction process. Glencoe: The Free Press, 1955
• Bumpass, Larry "What's happening to the family? Interactions between demographic and institutional change." Demography 27:483-498. 1990

[recommended:
Eastman, Moira "Myths of marriage and family" in Promises to keep, ed. by D. Popenoe, J. Elshtain, and D. Blankenhorn. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. 1996. pp. 35-68. ]

9/21 The anthropological sense.

• Lévi-Strauss, Claude "The family." In Man, culture and society, ed. by Shapiro, 1956: 261-285
• Peletz, Michael "Kinship studies in late twentieth century anthropology." Annual Review of Anthropology 24: 343-372. 1995

9/28 The historical sense.

• Hareven, Tamara "The history of the family and the complexity of social change." The American Historical Review 96: 95-124. 1991

  recommended:
  Thornton, Auland "Comparative and historical perspectives on marriage, divorce and the family." in Promises to keep ... pp. 69-87

10/5 The psychodynamic sense

• Reiss, David The family's construction of reality. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. 1981 (pp. 1-9, 78-152)

  recommended:
  Gubrium, Jaber and James Holstein What is family? Moutain View, CA: Mayfield Publ. 1990. (Chapters 1-5)

10/12Productive constraints: hoes vs. plows.

• Goody, Jack Production and Reproduction New York: Cambridge University Press, 1976 (pp 1-65)

10/19

More on reproductive constraints: plows vs. machines.

• Shorter, EdwardThe making of the modern family New York: Basic Books, 1975 (pp. 205-268)

10/26 Understanding the conditions of familial improvisation.

• Varenne, H. Ambiguous Harmony. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Pub. Corp., 1992 (Chap. 4-8)

11/2

STUDENT PROJECTS

11/9	Slave productions in a minor center of the United States.
	Gutman, Herbert The Black family in slavery and freedom, 1750-1925. New York: Pantheon Books, 1976 (Chap. 1 to 4)

11/16	Women at work in India
	Derne, Steve Culture in action Albany,NY: State University of New York Press, 1995

11/23

Constructions in poverty

Holloman, Regina, and Fannie Lewis "The 'Clan': Case study of a Black extended family in Chicago." in The extended family in Black societies. Ed. by D. Shimkin, E. Shimkin and D. Frate, 201-238. The Hague: Mouton. 1978 Shimkin, Demitri, G. Louie and D. Frate "The Black extended family: A basic rural institution and a mechanism of urban adaptation." in The extended family in Black societies. Ed. by D. Shimkin, E. Shimkin and D. Frate, 25-147. The Hague: Mouton. 1978

11/30

Middle class productions at the center of the United States: culture, mediation and bricolage

• Sweet, J. and Bumpass, L. American families and households. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. 1987. pp. 262-293.
• Varenne, H. Ambiguous Harmony. 1992 (Chap. 9)

12/7	Education, Schooling and families

• Varenne, H. & McDermott, R. P., "'Why Sheila can Read': Structure and indeterminacy in the reproduction of familial literacy." in The acquisition of literacy. Ed. by P. Gilmore and B. Schieffelin, 188-210. Norwood,NJ: Ablex Publishing Corp.. 1986

September 6, 1999