THE FUNCTIONALIST’S

VIEW ON FAMILY
 TABLE OF CONTENTS
•Short animation video of the Functionalist view on family.
•Functionalist’s view on family explanation.
• Diagram showing functionalist view on the role of family in the society.
•George Murdock view on family in the society.
•Critics of George Murdock view on family in the society.
FUNCTIONALIST’S VIEW ON
FAMILY EXPLANATION.
•Functionalists argue that all institutions in society have important roles to play in the
smooth and functional running of society, and the family is no different. They argue
that the family has important functions both for society and for individuals.
•To functionalist the family is at heart of society.
•For functionalists, the family creates well-integrated members of society and instills
culture into the new members of society. It provides important ascribed statuses such
as social class and ethnicity to new members. It is responsible for social replacement
by reproducing new members, to replace its dying members.
DIAGRAM SHOWING
FUNCTIONALIST VIEW ON THE
ROLE OF FAMILY IN THE SOCIETY.
 GEORGE MURDOCK VIEW ON
FAMILY IN THE SOCIETY.
•George Murdock was a social anthropologist who in the 1940s conducted cross cultural research
into 250 different societies from small hunter gatherer tribes to urbanized populations.
•Murdock, defined the family as a ‘social group characterized by common residence, economic
co-operation, and reproduction. It includes adults of both sexes, at least two of whom maintain a
socially approved sexual relationship, and one or more children, own or adopted, of the sexually
cohabiting adults.’
•He found that in each of these societies the family was a prominent institution which led him to
declare that the family unit was universal and it existed in all societies.
•He also found out that each of the societies he studied there was a core family type in which all
the families were developed.
•The core family was male a female and their children and while many societies have extensions
of this family.
• The most common type of what Murdock referred to was the nuclear family that existed in all of
the societies he researched and Murdock found that they were functionally important in other
words they provided clear functions for the members of the family and for wider society .
GEORGE MURDOCK VIEW ON
FAMILY IN THE SOCIETY.
•Murdock proposed that all families have four significant functions: sexual, economic,
reproductive, and educational.
•Sexual function: refers to the regulation of sexual activity.
•Economic function: provision of money and goods to satisfy the basic needs of its
members.
•Reproductive function: fulfilling the “sex need” for cohabitating adults and having
children.
•Educational or Socialization function: early socialization for children: assist the
school in continuing education at home. Teaching children values, norms and cultures.
CRITICISMS

•Functionalists have been viewing family in an over-romantic and idealized way.

•Ignores conflict in family, and the dark side of the family, e.g. violence and abuse.
•Ignores gender inequality within families.
•Ignores the rising divorce rates.
•Ignores growing family diversity.
THE END.