Family in Transition

This bestselling reader on families and intimate relationships identifies the most current trends, places them in historical context, and balances cutting-edge scholarship with perennial favorites. The authors, who are leading scholars, build each new edition from classic literature in a variety of disciplines as well as from the continuing stream of new family scholarship. Contributions provide new insights into family and explore many myths about family life.

New to This Edition

• Twelve of the thirty-eight readings are new.
• A new section, “Family and the Economy,” explores some of the structural changes in the economy that have had an impact on family life.
• New topics include: changing family demographics over the course of U.S. history, why gay men and women want to marry, the decline of dating and the rise of hooking up, adoption past and present, how a 24/7 economy affects families, financial pressures on middle-class mothers and fathers, gay and lesbian families, and the families of prison inmates.

*New to this edition

PART ONE--THE CHANGING FAMILY

Families Past and Present

1. William J. Goode / “The Theoretical Importance of the Family”

2. Anthony Giddens, “The Global Revolution in Family and Personal Life”   

3. Arlene Skolnick / “The Life Course Revolution” 

4. Donald J. Hernandez / “Changes in the Demographics of Families Over the Course of American History” *

Public Debates and Private Lives 

5. Sharon Hays / “The Mommy Wars: Ambivalence, Ideological Work, and the Cultural Contradictions of Motherhood” 

6. Janet Z. Giele / “Decline of the Family: Conservative, Liberal, and Feminist Views” 

7. George Chauncey / “Why Do Gays Want to Marry?”  *

PART TWO--SEX AND GENDER

Changing Gender Roles

8. Robert M. Jackson / “Destined for Equality”

9. Kathleen Gerson / “Children of the Gender Revolution: Some Theoretical Questions and Findings from the Field”

Sexuality and Society

10. Amy T. Schalet / “Raging Hormones, Regulated Love: Adolescent Sexuality in the United States and the Netherlands”

11. Beth Bailey / “Sexual Revolution(s)”

Courtship and Marriage

12. Paula England / “The Decline of Dating and the Rise of the Hook Up” *

13. Arlene Skolnick / “Grounds for Marriage: How Relationships Succeed or Fail” 

14. Lynne M. Casper and Suzanne M. Bianchi / “Cohabitation” 

15. Frank F. Furstenberg, Jr. / “The Future of Marriage”

Divorce and Remarriage

16. Karla B. Hackstaff / “Divorce Culture: A Quest for Relational Equality in Marriage”

17. Joan B. Kelly and Robert E. Emery / “Children’s Adjustment Following Divorce: Risk and Resilience Perspectives” 

18. Mary Ann Mason / “The Modern American Stepfamily: Problems and Possibilities”

PART THREE--PARENTS AND CHILDREN

Parenthood 

19. Philip Cowan and Carolyn Pape Cowan / “New Families: Modern Couples as New Pioneers”  

20. Dan Clawson and Naomi Gerstel / “Caring for Our Young: Child Care in Europe and the United States” 

21. Lawrence Friedman / “Who Are Our Children: Adoption Past and Present” *

22. Nicholas Townsend / “The Four Facets of Fatherhood” 

Childhood

23. Steven Mintz / “Beyond Sentimentality: American Childhood as a Social and Cultural Construct” 

24. Ellen Galinsky / “What Children Think about Their Working Parents”

25. Vern L. Bengston, Timothy J. Biblarz, and Robert E. L. Roberts / “How Families Still Matter: A Longitudinal Study of Youth in Two Generations”  

PART FOUR--FAMILIES IN SOCIETY

Work and Family

26. Katherine S. Newman / “Family Values against the Odds”

27. Arlie Hochschild, with Anne Machung / “The Second Shift: Working Parents and the Revolution at Home”

28. Jerry A. Jacobs and Kathleen Gerson / “The Work-Home Crunch” 

Family and the Economy 

29. Lillian B. Rubin / “Families on the Fault Line”

30. Harriet B. Presser / “The Economy That Never Sleeps” *

31. Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi / Why Middle-Class Mothers and Fathers Are Going Broke” *

Dimensions of Diversity

32. Ronald L. Taylor / “Diversity within African American Families” 

33. Maxine Baca Zinn and Barbara Wells / “Diversity within Latino Families: New Lessons for Family Social Science” 

34. Judith Stacey / “Gay and Lesbian Families: Queer Like Us” *

35. Karen Pyke / “‘The Normal American Family’ as an Interpretive Structure of Family Life among Grown Children of Korean and Vietnamese Immigrants” 

12    Trouble in the Family 

36. Jeremy Travis / “Prisoners’ Families and Children” *

37. Kathryn Edin and Maria Kefalas / “Unmarried with Children”

38. Denise A. Hines and Kathleen Malley-Morrison / “Issues in the Definition of Family Violence and Abuse” *