Family in Transition

Arlene Skolnick, Ph.D., is a Visiting Scholar at the sociology department at New York University, and a consultant to the Families and Work Institute.  For many years she was a member of the research staff at the Institute of Human Development, at the University of California, Berkeley, where she worked on the Berkeley Longitudinal Studies, examining the emotional lives and marriages of study members as they evolved from childhood to middle age. More recently, Professor Skolnick has been studying the sources and impact of job stress on the families of police officers.  She has also taken part in several interdisciplinary projects dealing with social science, law and family policy.  In recent years, she helped to organize a monthly Family Policy Seminar at Berkeley, and co-edited the book that grew out of the seminar: All Our Families: New Policies for a New Century.  Professor Skolnick has published a number of other books and articles on marriage and the family, includingFamily in Transition and Embattled Paradise: The American Family in an Age of Uncertainty. She is currently at work on a book entitled The Unfinished Family: The Future of Love and Work.   Jerome Skolnick, a sociologist, currently teaches at the New York University School of Law where he is Co-Director of the Center for Research in Crime and Justice. He is also Claire Clements Dean’s Professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, where he was Chair of the Center for the Study of Law and Society. He has written many books and articles and has received numerous grants, honors and awards in recognition of his research and scholarship. These include the August Vollmer award of the American Society of Criminology; awards for distinguished scholarship from the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences and the Western Society of Criminology; the Mills award of the Society for the Study of Social Problems (for Justice Without Trial); election to the honorary Sociological Research Association; and a Guggenheim Foundation fellowship. He was Director of the Task Force on Violent Protest and Confrontation of the  National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence, Washington, D.C. 1968-1969 and served as President of the American Society of Criminology from November 1993 through November 1994. In 1997, he completed a three year term as Chair of the National Academy of Science/ National Research Council's Committee on Law and Justice. In 1996 he was honored by John Jay College of Criminal Justice as their Criminal Justice Educator of the Year.  

IN THIS SECTION:

1. BRIEF

2. COMPREHENSIVE

  

 

BRIEF TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

Part I The Changing Family 

1.  Families Past and Present

2.  Public Debates and Private Lives 

 



Part II Sex and Gender

3.  Changing Gender Roles

4.  Sexualtiy and Society

5.  Courtship and Marriage

6.  Divorce and Remarriage

 



Part III Parents and Children

7.  Parenthood

8.  Childhood and Youth

 



Part IV Families in Society

9.  Work and Family Life

10.  Family and the Economy

11.  Dimensions of Diversity

12.  Trouble in the Family

 

 

COMPREHENSIVE TABLE OF CONTENTS



* New to this Edition

 

Part I  The Changing Family

 

1.  Families Past and Present

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

Reading 2  Anthony Giddens / The Global Revolution in Family and Personal Life

* Reading 3  Eriikka Oinonin / Family in Finland and Spain

 

2.  Public Debates and Private Lives

Reading 4   Sharon Hays / The Mommy Wars: Ambivalence, Ideological Work, and the Cultural Contradictions of Motherhood

Reading 5   Janet  Z. Giele / Decline of the Family: Conservative, Liberal, and Feminist Views

 

Part II Sex and Gender

 

3.  Changing Gender Roles

Reading 6  Robert M. Jackson / Destined for Equality

* Reading 7  Gail Collins / The Ice Cracks

* Reading 8  Kathleen Gerson / Falling Back on Plan B: The Children of the Gender Revolution Face Uncharted Territory

 

4.  Sexualtiy and Society

Reading 9   Beth Bailey / Sexual Revolution(s)

* Reading 10  Kathleen A. Bogle / Hooking Up and Dating: A Comparison

* Reading 11  Margaret Talbot / Red Sex, Blue Sex

 

5.  Courtship and Marriage

Reading 12  Lynne M. Casper and Suzanne M. Bianchi / Cohabitation

* Reading 13  Maria Kefalas, Frank Furstenberg, and Laura Napolitano / Marriage is More than Being Together: The Meaning of Marriage among Young Adults in the United States

Reading 14  Andrew J. Cherlin / American Marriage in the Early Twenty-First Century

Reading 15  Arlene Skolnick / Grounds for Marriage: How Relationships Succeed or Fail

 

6.  Divorce and Remarriage

Reading 16  Lawrence M. Friedman / Divorce: The “Silent Revolution”

* Reading 17  Virginia E. Rutter / Divorce in Research vs. Divorce in Media

Reading 18  Mary Ann Mason / The Modern American Stepfamily: Problems and Possibilities

 

Part III Parents and Children

 

7.  Parenthood

Reading 19  Philip Cowan and Carolyn Pape Cowan / New Families: Modern Couples as New Pioneers

* Reading 20  William Marsiglio / Healthy Dads, Healthy Kids

 

8.  Childhood and Youth

Reading 21  Steven Mintz / Beyond Sentimentality: American Childhood as a Social and Cultural Construct

Reading 22  Annette Lareau / Unequal Childhoods: Class, Race, and Family Life

* Reading 23  Frank Furstenberg / Diverging Development: The Not-so-Invisible Hand of Social Class in the United States

* Reading 24  Katherine S. Newman / Ties That Bind: Cultural Interpretations of Delayed Adulthood in Western Europe and Japan

 

Part IV Families in Society

 

9.  Work and Family Life

Reading 25  Arlie Hochschild  with Anne Machung / The Second Shift: Working Parents and the Revolution at Home

Reading 26  Pamela Stone / The Rhetoric and Reality of “Opting Out”

 

10.  Family and the Economy

Reading 27  Lillian Rubin / Families on the Fault Line

Reading 28  Harriet B. Presser / The Economy That Never Sleeps

* Reading 29  Katherine S. Newman and Victor Tan Chen / The Missing Class: Portraits of the Near Poor in American

Reading 30  Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi / Why Middle-Class Mothers and Fathers Are Going Broke

 

11.  Dimensions of Diversity

Reading 31  Ronald L. Taylor / Diversity within African American Families

Reading 32  Maxine Baca Zinn and Barbara Wells / Diversity within Latino Families: New Lessons for Family Social Science

* Reading 33  Min Zhou / Conflict, Coping, and Reconciliation in Chinese Immigrant Families

Reading 34  Rona J. Karasik and Raeann R. Hamon / Cultural Diversity and Aging Families

Reading 35  Judith Stacy / Gay and Lesbian Families: Queer Like Us

 

12.  Trouble in the Family

Reading 36  Jeremy Travis / Prisoners’ Families and Children

Reading 37  Kathryn Edin and Maria Kefalas / Unmarried with Children