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Title: The Way We Really Are: Coming to Terms With America's Changing Families by Stephanie Coontz ISBN: 0-465-09092-3 Publisher: Basic Books Pub. Date: 01 April, 1998 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $17.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.33 (6 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: It¿s OK to get divorced
Comment: This book describes factors playing for and against the well-being of families in the US today. The book seems to have 3 simultaneous goals: to describe and contrast the economic conditions of single- and two-parent heterosexual families, to provide self-help, support or guidance for two-parent families in crisis, and to suggest government policies to help American families thrive. Some of the topics covered in the book include: the idealization of the 1950s, working mothers, the future of marriage, divorce, traditions that should be abandoned, who's to blame for families in crisis, societal change and risk for kids, and the strengths and vulnerabilities for today's families.
The title of the book misled me a little. With a title like "The Way We Really Are", I expected the book to detail the kinds of families that exist in the US today. I was interested in learning how many families consist of adults with their own children, or with step children, or with no children, and how these numbers are changing. And how many families consist of homosexual couples with children, and is this number growing? How many families are nuclear families, and how many extended families do we find in the US today? Are there differences in these statistics according to race or ethnic background? What about family units that consist of divorced or widowed adults and in-laws, step-parents, or aunts or uncles? But that's not what this book is about. Most of the book deals exclusively with the economic well-being of single and two parent heterosexual nuclear families. Homosexual families are mentioned briefly in a few paragraphs towards the end of the book, and extended families receive no mention at all. Even when Coontz discusses two-parent families with a breadwinner and a homemaker, she always assumes that the breadwinner is a male, and doesn't consider or describe when it's the other way around, or provide statistics about female breadwinner families.
The main thesis of the book seems to be that many American families are in crisis today. The reasons for this are varied, from unrealistic idealization of the 1950s, to government policies that run counter to the needs of families. Coontz argues that right-wing groups that claim to be pro-family by stressing the need for children to be raised in families with 2 married parents may be unrealistic and actually work against the children's welfare.
While I found many of Coontz's arguments convincing, I think she could have gone further by giving a lot more thought to families and economic conditions in other parts of the world rather than confining her research and hypotheses strictly to the US. For instance, she suggests that during the industrial revolution in the US, there was a debate over "whether to protect women's interests by secluding them in the family, away from the rough-and-tumble competition of the capitalist market and political party system, or to grant women the same independent legal and political existence that white men had acquired, so they could claim their interests as a right." Coontz seems to be suggesting here that after the Civil War, women were being kept at home to protect them from market forces, and that that's why they weren't given property rights or allowed to open bank accounts on their own, etc. But given what we find in the rest of the world, I think it may have been the case that women were kept on the farm because of the common trend worldwide to try to keep women in seclusion, as can still be found today throughout the Muslim world, or parts of Asia. And property rights weren't restricted from women just because of industrialization- -I'm not sure, but I think there is a long history of such restrictions throughout European law, as well as in the rest of the world. On the other hand, she may have found support for her thesis that two parent families aren't a panacea in themselves if she had considered modern Japanese families, which very often consist of the two-parent, two child, male breadwinner ideal, and which are quite often completely dysfunctional when judged by American standards, in which we expect the parents to have healthy emotional ties to each other and the children. All in all, while Coontz has some interesting points, I would be more interested in seeing a book with a little less advice and a little more thought about all the various types of American families considered in a world-wide context.
Rating: 5
Summary: Recommended for parents as well as students
Comment: The Way We Really Are is recommended for parents as well as students of sociology and contemporary affairs: Stephanie Coontz provides an examination of America's changing families, from the different systems of cooperative and step-families to studies on changing traditional family methods and structures. An intriguing survey of family relationships is revealed.
Rating: 1
Summary: Be afraid. Be very afraid. (of this book)
Comment: I think Ms. Coontz read way too much into the Chicken Little story. The sky isn't falling, it's just people throwing rocks at each other. She has certainly managed to tap into the "it isn't my fault" mentality so widespread on today's society. Why blame broken families on a lack of morals and poor personal choices, when we can simply say, "Society made me do it."
Who knows? There may just be enough lost souls seeking to avoid blame and responsibility to make this a best seller. I, for one, hope not.
Climbing back up a slippery slope is always a struggle, but that doesn't mean it can't be done or that we shouldn't try. Didn't your Mom & Dad always say, "If your friends jump off a cliff, does that mean you should?" Mom & Dad were right, you know. Ms. Coontz, on the other hand, would cheer you on as you to step into the abyss.
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Title: The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap by Stephanie Coontz ISBN: 0465090974 Publisher: Basic Books Pub. Date: August, 2000 List Price(USD): $19.50 |
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Title: In the Name of the Family: Rethinking Family Values in the Postmodern Age by Judith Stacey ISBN: 0807004332 Publisher: Beacon Press Pub. Date: 01 September, 1997 List Price(USD): $12.50 |
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Title: The Second Shift by Arlie Russell Hochschild, Anne Machung ISBN: 0142002925 Publisher: Penguin Books Pub. Date: 29 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
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Title: The Time Bind: When Work Becomes Home and Home Becomes Work by Arlie Russell Hochschild ISBN: 0805066438 Publisher: Owl Books (NY) Pub. Date: 01 April, 2001 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title: American Families: A Multicultural Reader by Stephanie Coontz, Maya Parson, Gabrielle Raley ISBN: 0415915740 Publisher: Routledge Pub. Date: 01 December, 1998 List Price(USD): $36.95 |
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