Anthropologically speaking, the “traditional” idea of a family (two heterosexual adults and children) is actually quite a modern idea. For most of history, people lived in rather communal societies of shared child-rearing, polygamy and care. Therefore, the notion of familial intimacy was subservient to the ideals of the greater community. This shift to closed units of private family life thus marked the need to define how one should and does feel towards their direct family unit. However, the recent transition towards a pattern of non-traditional families has seen an emerging reliance on “social networks” and friendships; essentially a post-modern throwback to pre-modern conditions. By placing the “traditional” family as the historical oddity, “a tribalist model” emerges which redefines family to include a group of people with whom you share intimate connections of trust and intimacy, thus reworking the characteristics of family from an economic relation to an emotional relation (Roseneil and Budgeon, 149). However, I see problems in this rather loose definition in terms of the law. Issues of inheritance, rights of visitation and health coverage, to name a few, rely on normative definitions of a family that may conflict with personal identification of who constitutes family.
To address the TED talk by Helen Fisher, I think it is important to differentiate between her research, focused on the chemical reactions of love, and the issue discussed by the various authors, focused on the creation of social networks. Although her argument is hard to refute, I think it comes down to what type of relationship you wish to study. I see the one side looking at love as an intimate bond between people and animals, an intrinsic attraction, and the other side looking at love as a personal and social construct. To compare the two, one must look at the motives behind their initiation as a function of economical, structural or chemical causes. Additionally, if one is say that the need for love, the addiction to love, is biological, several questions arise such as why humans’ needs for love change over their lifetime (and the sources of this love), where asexuality fits into her schema, and how this knowledge could be used in determining marriage success, itself a scary idea.
Feminist feelings aside, I was a bit taken back by the modern advice books suggestion to “assert that it’s a ‘feminine’ practice to subordinate the importance of love” (Hochschild, 27). First of all, by adopting a “unisex code based on the old code for men,” women would be doing exactly what they criticize me for in the first place (Hochschild, 27). By gendering emotions, such as anger and depression, we limit our ability to express them without “masculinizing” or “feminizing” ourselves according to social definitions. While I don’t expect men to suddenly become an shower of emotions (that would require an entire shift in our social views of emotional expression and such), I also don’t think it will improve communication and progress between the sexes if women suddenly adopt a philosophy promoting adultery, casual sex and delaying love. I foresee that that would simply lead to a symmetrical schismogenesis for relational power which leaves me questioning where the children of couples fit in, a point also noted by Hochschild (125). Perhaps more realistic is a shift towards a middle ground dissuading men from these actions while encouraging women to become more independent by establishing structural changes for increased autonomy. I see the end goal of “confluent love” as legal, emotional, physical and spiritual autonomy promoting symmetrical equality without detriment to others (Gidden, 61).
Q1: In reading these articles, I was constantly reminded of the old cliche: "You choose your friends, not your family.” But, Roseneil and Budgeon’s article contradicts this cliché as their four examples did in fact choose whom they wished to constitute their family. How does this reconstitution and relabeling of social networks and familial ties affect the previously definition of family based on consanguine relations?
Q2: Hochschild talks about “commercialized niceness” and the way in which the overabundance of niceties in society leads to a diminution of their value while simultaneously validating the truthfulness of negative emotions, such as anger and sadness (84). What effects do you think this has on the ability of people to express emotions overall? Do you think this hold on negative emotion-sharing transcends into the private sphere? Is it perhaps simply a way of “being polite,” of not making the world your therapist, within the public sphere?
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