Family

Family is the most basic and oldest unit of a social system. Across the human history Family has
been the basis of social identity in alliance, social status and economic resource distribution.
(Giddens, 2010; Perry and Perry, 2012) says that the family largely continues to remain the most
relevant of primary groups, and the most important element in the socialization process.
However, till date there has been no standard definition of ‘family’. Creating a clear, formal
definitions of family would only lead to the exclusion of a majority of family units. Given, the
plurality of family forms, it is appropriate to use the term ‘families’ rather than just ‘family’.

Defining FAMILY

Mainstream family studies explain family as that unit where: ‘(i) at least two adult persons of
opposite sex reside together, (ii) they engage in some kind of division of labor, (iii) they engage
in many types of economic and social exchanges; that is they do things for one another; (iv) they
share many things in common, such as: food, sex, residence, and both goods and social activities,
(v) the adults have parental relations with their children, as their children have filial relations
with them; the parents have some authority over their children and both share with one another,
while also assuming some obligation for protection, cooperation, and nurturance. (vi) there are
sibling relations among the children themselves, with, once more, a range of obligations to share,
protect and help one another. When all these conditions exist, few people would deny that the
unit is a family.’ (Goode, 1982, p. 9).

Family is also defined as ‘a group of individuals related to one another by blood ties, marriage or
adoption, who form an economic unit, the adult members of which are responsible for the
upbringing of children’ (Giddens, 2010, p. 331).

Characteristics of the family

In India, the family structure has now become commonplace in Indian sociology and social
anthropology to distinguish between ‘household’ and ‘family’.

Household and Family

However, for the sake of technical analysis, ‘household’ is distinguished from ‘family’. For
example, two brothers and their wives and children may live in two separate households, but
they may be bound by relationships and obligations of many kinds and thus form a family.
a household is the basic residential unit where economic production, consumption, inheritance,
child rearing and shelter are organized and carried out. As research on the institution of family
unfolded, It was realized that a family does not necessarily consist of only one household.

Often family is an extension of two or more households, members of which though may have
separate residence yet may belong to same family and have familial bonding and responsibilities.
Therefore, family along with being a functional unit is more of an ideological and emotional
unit,

House- hold may be described as more of a functional unit used as the unit of analysis to
understand Indian social structure rather than ‘family’. Proper object of study should be the
household dimension of family rather than family itself. According to the scholars in India the
changes in family that are taking place is more complex than a simple move towards nuclear
family and erosion of traditional values.

Family studies also pointed that the types of households based on the composition of family are
interrelated in a developmental process which may be in progression or in regression.
Progressive development of a household takes place due to increase in membership, mainly by
birth and marriage, while regressive development takes place due to decrease in membership,
mainly by marriage, death and partition. Decline in the size of the household cannot be inferred
as breakdown of the family. Common residence is only one way of manifestations of familial
bonding which can exist without joint property and residence.

Census of India has presently adopted a definition of household which is based on the criterion
of group of members using a common hearth but not necessarily related by blood, kinship
rules and marriage. For the purpose of these surveys, household is a technical economic
unit/category.
According to the Census of India, “A ‘household’ is usually a group of persons who normally
live together and take their meals from a common kitchen unless the exigencies of work prevent
any of them from doing so. Persons in a household may be related or unrelated or a mix of both.
Classification of family
Historically, the family has existed in two major forms.
One is the extended, or consanguine, family (of the same blood). However, these are not the
only two forms of family but there are various forms of family that existed across time and
across societies in the same period of time.
Other criteria based on which families can be distinguished like:
descent, residence, membership, number of mates, and authority.

Based on Descent:
Descent refers to the system by which members of a society/family trace kinship over
generations. They have certain commonalities in their adhering to rules of common property and
income, co-residence, commensality, co-worship and performance of certain rights and
obligations On the basis of ancestors or the descent family can be divided into two main types

1) Patrilineal family is the family wherein the members trace their kinship and lineage
through the father or the male members in the family. Property is transferred through the male
line from father to sons. This is one of the most common forms of family.
2) Matrilineal family is the family wherein the members trace their kinship and lineage
through the mother or the female members in the family. Property is transferred through the
female line from mother to daughters. Such communities may also be matrilocal in nature. This
type of family is found in only certain pockets of the world such as amongst the Garo and Khasi
tribes of Northeast India and the Nair matriliny in Kerala.

Based on Residence:

1. Patrilocal Family: In this type of family, after marriage the wife goes and lives in the
family of her husband. This family is also known as Virilocal family.
2. Matrilocal Family: In this family, after marriage the husband goes and lives in the house
of his wife. This type of family is also known as Uxorilocal Family.
3. Neo-local Family: When the married couple after marriage resides in a new place and
establishes family independent of their parents or of their relatives it is known as neo-
local family.
4. Duo-local Family: In this type of family, after marriage the wife continues to stay with
her mother’s family and the husband continues to live with his mother’s family. Nair
matriliny and Matriliny in Lakshdweep are examples of Duo-local family.

Membership
Family can be classified according to the number of members found in the family or the size of
the family. The depth of generations found in a family determines the form of the family

1. Nuclear family: The term nuclear family refers to the unit consisting of a married couple
and their dependent children, i.e., mother, father and child (ren). This family is also known as the
conjugal family meaning ‘based on marriage’. This kind of nuclear family was regarded as the
normal family unit in North America and Europe. Presently, the definition of nuclear family
refers to a group consisting of one or two parents and dependent offspring, which may include
step-parent, step-siblings and adopted children. It is also used to cover the social reality of
several types of small parent child units, including single parents with children and same-sex
couples with children.
 2. Extended Family: A family system wherein several generations live in one household. It
includes not only husband, wife and their offspring but also a number of blood relatives (with
their mates and children), who live together and are considered a family unit. The term ‘extended
family’ in anthropology usually referred to a family including three or more generations. In the
Indian context, however, families that include lineal and collateral links but may not include
several generations were known and similarly referred to as “joint” families. The structure of the
Indian family was predominantly of the joint family type. But surveys and the census pointed out
that nuclear family arrangements have always pre dominated over joint family arrangements.
3. Number of Mates
Family can be classified according to the number of mates a man or woman has through
marriage,
1) Monogamous family: In this type of family the spouses have one partner each and follow
monogamy as a rule for marriage.
2) Polygamous family: This can be of two kinds i.e. polygyny and polyandry.In polygyny the
husband is allowed to have two or more wives. In polyandry the wife is allowed to have two or
more husbands. Polygyny is more commonly found as compared to polyandry. Todas of south
India and Khasas of Himachal Pradesh in India followed polyandrous family system. Today
there is an increasing recognition that the term family should by no means only be understood as
involving heterosexual couples and their children. Homosexual couples with or without children
also form a household and family unit. There are voluntary aggregates consisting of two or more.
homosexuals that homosexuals call families. Homosexual friendship networks, lesbian/gay
couples, and homosexual communes are some example of homosexual families. Raising children
can be as much a purpose for lesbians and gays forming families as for heterosexuals.
Additionally the above relationships may be open or closed, biological or adoptive, contractual
or informal. These pairs, friendship circles, sister/brotherhoods, marriages,
and communes comprise what lesbians and gays call ‘family’. Society’s heterosexual hegemony
has overshadowed studies on homosexual family and therefore there is a dearth of research on
homosexual families in the existing family study scholarship.

4. Authority
Here, the member of the family who holds the authority/power over other members of the family
defines the kind of the family it is.
Patriarchal Family: Authority lies in the hands of the ‘patriarch’ or the male head of the family.
The word ‘patriarchy’ literally means the rule of the father or the ‘patriarch’, and originally it
was used to describe a specific type of ‘male dominated family’ – the large household of the
patriarch which included women, junior men, children, slaves and domestic servants all under
the rule of this dominant male. A man is thus considered the head of the household; within the
family he controls women’s sexuality, labour or production, reproduction and mobility. There is
a hierarchy is which the man is the superior and dominant, woman is inferior and subordinate.