Chapter 2Family & Personal Relationships (1)

Focal questions 1. What are the traditional expectations of mar

riage in Britain? (Pp19, 22, 23) 2. How do you visualise the typical family in m

odern Britain? (Pp 19) 3. What changes in the family and marriage ha

ve occured since the Second World War? Which are the most significant? How do you explain them? (Pp 19, 20, 24, 25, 26)

4. What do you understand of the term "youth culture"? Can you give some specific examples of youth subcultures or cults? Do all youth subcultures have certain common features? (P21)

A 1 The Family

Diverse familiesNuclear familyLone-parent familyCohabiting coupleCommon-law/de facto marriageCivil partnership

A 1 Family cont. Marriage: half—fail; rate—lowest since

records in 1840 Divorce: rate—highest in Europe; 1+ch

ild/4 before age 16—divorce of their parents

Lone parenting: increased three-fold in the last 20 years, 1/10 families

4/10 people: born outside marriage 1/10: cohabiting

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=1865

Family size Complete family size of 2 kids: 1/3 wome

n Childlessness: 1/5 women Causes: Falling infant death rates fell The expense of having children Career vs. children

Darren HayesSavage Garden

Darren on thecivil partnership ceremony

"I can honestly say it was the happiest day of my life," writes Hayes of the civil partnership ceremony, which took place in London. "I feel lucky to live in an era where my relationship can be considered legally legitimate, and I commend the U.K. government for embracing this very basic civil liberty."

Darren on thecivil partnership ceremony

Britain legalized civil partnerships in December 2005.

Civil Partnership Act 2004 Same-sex couples http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Partners

hip_Act_2004

London

the most popular region within the UK in which to register a partnership in 2007

The London Borough of Westminster Brighton and Hove Unitary Authority http:

//www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=1685

Living in Britain General Household Survey 2002

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=1685

Living in Britain General Household Survey 2002

A 2 YouthYouth: an age group?A social organizationThe 1950s: about ten years after t

he end of WWII A rise in the birth rate Music, films, fashion‘Youth subculture’—teenagers

A 5 50 Years of Change

The 1950s – a time of great changes in fields of economy, culture, politics.

The 1960s – a decade of rebellious young generation of great expectation

A 5 50 Years of Change

The 1970s – a decade of strikes and recession

The 1980s – a decade of Thatcherism

The 1990s – a decade of great expectation

A2 Youth (1970s)Youth Subcultures

Subculture : a ‘cultural group within a larger culture often having beliefs or interests at variance with those of the larger culture (COD)

A distinct individual style – certain ways of dressing, speaking, listening to music and gathering in similar places

The way of life Inevitable products of affluent society To leave: usu. at the point of marriage

A2 Youth—Teddy Boys

Rock 'n' Roll: black origin, white musicians like Elvis

Teenage cults Music of the Teddy Boys or 'Teds' Slicked-back ‘quiffs’ or ‘DA’ (ducktai

l) haircuts Narrow ‘drainpipe’ trousers ‘Drape’ jackets, fancy shirts ‘Bootlace’ ties

A 2 YouthTeddy Boys: Characteristics

Group-mindedness – a reaffirmation of traditional working class values and the strong sense of territory

Extreme touchiness (over-sensitivity) to insults Conditions for its formation – extensive welfare

provision (social security, health, housing), European economic boom with Marshall plan, abolishing of draft, introduction of hire purchase

Drastical and fundamental alteration of the concept of the adolescent

A 2 Youth cont.Teddy Boys in the 1950s

A 2 Youth cont.The Beatniks

The “beat” movement in the US in the 1950s Rejection of traditional middle-class American

values, customs The “Beat generation”—beatitude Sputnik I Their visual symbols - jazz, poetry, marijuann

a, the Beatles Counter-cultural, anti-materialistic, bettering t

he inner self

A 2 Youth Beatniks: Characteristics

Extremely pessimistic about future & possibilities of progress

Aspired for freedom and the anguish of being alone, undecided and separate

No popularity in Britain until mid-1960s; the Hippies

The Simpsons episode

A 2 YouthThe Beatniks

A 2 YouthThe Beatles

A 2 YouthThe Rolling Stones

A 2 Youth (The 1960s) Mods and Rockers

A new mood of optimism and change Rockers: rock 'n' roll & big motorbikes; 'dressed

down' (in leather jackets and denim); working class, masculinity driven

Mods: American rhythm and blues music & scooters; 'dressed up' (in sharp suits and ties—Italian style); working-class, non-traditional clerical or service jobs

A 2 YouthRockers and their motor-bikes

A 2 YouthMods and their scootors

A2 YouthThe Hippies

‘Hippie’: bohemian, student and radical subcultures

Being critical of growing dominance of technology & bureaucracy of capitalist societies

Distrust of establishment Criticism of inequality and affluence of society Search of social change through peaceful mea

ns Contradictions: Anti-materialistic, yet lived to share the fruits

of affluence Pro-egalitarian, but reactionary

A 2 YouthSkinheads cont.

The unskilled working-class community Working-class activities: pubs, football and str

eets, associated with football hooliganism The end of the 1960s, relative worsening of situ

ation of working-class Dress – big industrial boots & jeans rolled up h

igh to reveal them Appearance –hair cut to the skull Emphasis on collectivity, physical toughness,

and local rivalry; targets for the aggression—hippies

A2 Youth cont.Hippies (left) Skin heads (right)

A2 Youth (1970s) Punks

The 1970s: Punk, Heavy Metal Punk: youth culture in the extreme Spiked hair, ripped and

outlandishly customized clothing Obscene language (much-publicized) To both cut themselves off from society an

d to shock it into action Heavy Metal music: grew in the 1970s; bike

rs

A 2 Youth cont.The punks

Taxi Driver

Travis Bickle Jodie Foster John Hinckley President Reagan

A2 Youth (1970s) Rastafarianism--Rastas

Rastafarianism: a philosophy and a religion originating in Jamaica; black Britain; the reggae music of Bob Marley.

The Influence of Reggae on Punk

Search for authenticity The romanticization of petty criminality “white translation of black ethnicity” (Hebdige

p.64)—Elvis Presley: “white nigger” Reggae music

Non-mainstream Working class credentials Political awareness Music of the “outsider”

A 2 Youth (1980s) The Ravers

the New Romantics— wearing flamboyant clothes often like those of the 18C 'dandies'

Hip Hop, the black communities of the USA, rap music, graffiti art, sportswear-based dress and other cultural elements

Rave, grew out of the 'acid house' cult of 1988. American 'house' music, baggy colourful clothing drugs like LSD and Ecstacy. All night dancing events called raves in remote out-of-the-way places

Graffiti—art or vandalism?

A 2 Youth (the 1990s)Ragga & Jungle

Predominantly black, ragga music, a dance-oriented form of reggae commonly with the lyric spoken or 'chatted'

Young Asians born in Britain: 'bhangramuffin‘, the Asian music, Bhangra

Jungle, elements of house music and rave culture; the most innovative, original youth culture of the mid-1990s

Oasis

60后  70后  80后  90后 1、关于工作  60后：他们要么狂工作，要么不工作 ,狂工作的是为了尽早不工作。

70后：工作狂基本上都是 70后的。80后：拒绝加班！90后 ：拒绝上班！  

60后  70后  80后  90后  2、 关于穿着  60后：买衣服要么去购物广场，要么去批发市场。  

70后：喜欢穿中等价位牌子的衣服 ,价钱决定购买 . 

80后： 喜欢潮流品牌 ,搭配出 FEEL的都不惜购买 . 

90后：个性服饰 ,穿衣基本靠冲动 .   

60后  70后  80后  90后  3、关于 K歌   60后：一般只喝不 K，即使 K，也是喝了酒之后，大体是“一无所有”、“北方的狼”  

70后：唱 k的时候只会乱吼——例如 2002年的第一场雪，然后就拼命拉着你喝酒，不让你唱。  

80后：Mic霸。   90后 ：不止会唱，还会跳！    

A 2 YouthMillennial Tension

Young males – postmodernity destroyed traditional social role, respect, authority

Erosion of ‘masculine’ forms of work, sources of self-respect

A 2 YouthSuicide Solution

Massive increases in suicide amongst young males in UK (5X higher than young women)

A 2 YouthConclusion

Commercial consumption Blurring of upper and lower boundaries More escapist than oppositional Absorption into mainstream Reinforced expectation that youth will gener

ate consumer ideals Childhood—modernist optimism, youth—po

stmodernist freedom and possibility The real problems

YouthSamuel Erman

1. Youth is not a time of life, it is a state of mind, it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips and supple knees, it is a matter of the will, a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions, it is the freshness of the deep spring of life.

Youth cont

2. Youth means a temperamental predominance of courage over timidity, of the appetite for adventure over the love of ease. This often exists in a man of 60 more than a boy of 20. Nobody grows merely by a number of years; we grow old by deserting our ideas.

3. Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, fear, self-distrust bows the heart and turns the spirit back to dust.

Youth cont 4. Whether 60 or 16, there is in every

human being’s heart the lure of wonders, the unfailing childlike appetite of what’s next and the joy of the game of living. In the center of your heart and my heart there is a wireless station: so long as it receives messages of beauty, hope, cheer, courage and power from man and from the Infinite, so long as you are young.

Youth cont

5. When the aerials are down, and your spirits are covered with snows of cynicism and the ice of pessimism, then you’ve grown old even at 20, but as long as your aerials are up to catch waves of optimism, there’s hope you may die young at 80.

A 4 Marriage & Divorce

Marriage and cohabitation In 2000 : 54% of men & 52% of women aged 16 and over:

married 10% of men & nine% of women: cohabiting 27% of men & 18% of women: single 3% of men & 12% of women: widowed 6% of men & 9% of women: divorced or separa

ted

A 4 Marriage & Divorce

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=170

Sociological Explanations of the Increase in Divorce

The value of marriage Conflict between spouses The ease of divorce Women, paid employment and marital

conflict Income and class Age Marital status of parents Background and role expectations Occupation

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=1866

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=1925

All the lonely people

40 years ago,the Beatles asked the world a simple question,they wanted to know where all the lonely people come from.

Grey’s Anatomy All the lonely people, where do they all com

e from? All the lonely people, where do they all belong?

Eleanor Rigby, Beatles

A 1 The Family cont.One-parent families & their

dependent children

0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

2.0

2.2

2.4

2.6

2.8

3.0

1984

1985

1986

1987

1988

1989

1990

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

Estim

ate

d n

um

ber

(mill

ions)

Dependent children inone-parent families

One-parent families

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=1748

A 1 Family cont. The traditional family: in decline? The Soul of Britain survey: 80% of Britons: marriage is not out-dated 76% of Britons: marriages to last for life 46% of Britons: lone parenting as a lifestyle c

hoice Columnist Melanie Phillips: the traditional nu

clear family—at the root of democracy (secure, stable, inner-directed and self-confident, a sense of duty and responsibility)

A 1 Family cont.

Traditional families are better for children Bob Rowthorne (professor of economics

at Cambridge University): step families are very dangerous places for children to be—Higher rate of child murder

Lone-parent families or cohabiting families — not stable

Lone-parent families: poverty and social problems related to poverty

A 1 The FamilyHome is Where the Heart is

Stable marriage – a happy home life in Millennium Britain (a new Alliance & Leicester public opinion poll by MORI)

1,938 people: what would be the most important ingredient to family life in 25 years time

Stable marriage and less divorce: more than one in four people (26 per cent)

Consistent across all age groups

Towards a More Civilised Society

European economies: joint taxation In Britain: family commitments—largely i

rrelevant to tax assessment Call for approbation and support from th

e state The married family & the nurture of childr

en -- Center for Policy Studies