Human society develops, the mechanisms of interaction between people change, and social institutions, such as the family, change in the same way. The traditional family was characteristic of the agrarian society, the industrial one was characterized by its nuclear type, but in the modern world a new phenomenon is being born - the post-industrial family.
Traditional family
The family is the unit of society. Everyone has heard this phrase since childhood. It is this view of the family that is characteristic of the traditional understanding of it. The traditional family was formed when people lived on subsistence or semi-subsistence farming. That is, everything had to be done independently: growing food, keeping livestock and even spinning cloth for clothing. If the family coped well with their tasks, then all its members were full and did not die of hunger. The feelings of people getting married were generally not considered too much. The economic component was considered the priority in the family.
Everyone's personal life was controlled by societies and other family members. There was a single head of the family, and the rest obeyed him. It is the patriarchal type of family that is considered traditional, when three or more generations simultaneously lived in the same house. The newlyweds could not "move out" and take a separate house.
The attitude towards children and women in a traditional family was sometimes quite cruel. Children were seen as a labor force. They began to work from an early age. If people believed that the child would be "an extra mouth," then they simply stopped feeding him, especially often this was done with babies who were not yet able to work and help the family survive. For example, L. N. Tolstoy, as well as researchers of peasant life.
A woman in a patriarchal family is always subordinate. Whatever character she possessed, no matter how smart or strong, she still depended on the decisions of her husband, who, in turn, depended on the decisions of her father.
The traditional family is characterized by the lack of responsibilities of the elders to the younger in rank, but the exaggeration of the responsibilities of the younger to the elders. Domestic violence - beating of the wife and children - has always been a feature of traditional families all over the world.
Nuclear family
As soon as people acquired the opportunity to work and be independent, their income and well-being ceased to depend on coordinated actions within the family. Therefore, the instruments of control over each person by the family have become much smaller.
Love and the decision with whom to start a family have become a personal matter for everyone. The need to live in a large group disappeared, and the nuclear family, that is, consisting of a couple and a small number of their children, became widespread. Despite the fact that some consider this transition to be a disaster, the researchers note that it has many positive aspects, for example, domestic violence in families is gradually disappearing.
In an industrialized society, spouses are faced with the need to educate and provide for their children, at the same time, child labor is no longer used. Therefore, the birth rate naturally falls.
However, parenting and the monopoly on sex still belong to the family. The role of man and woman has not changed: the husband earns money, and the wife raises children and takes care of the house.
Postindustrial family
Thanks to the ever-growing economic independence of women, marriage for them has lost its attractiveness from the point of view of the organization of its future. The "sexual revolution" took place, so the family also lost its monopoly on sex. Thus, in the post-industrial world, the family, in comparison with the traditional one, has fully retained only the function of raising children.
