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'A wonderfully optimistic and original book... No doubt it will be extremely reassuring for readers and everyone will find some nuggets that are helpful to them'Professor Susan Golombok'Helpful to anyone interested in learning more about their own families. I highly recommend it'Dr Joshua ColemanFamily researcher Lucy Blake pulls apart our expectations about family and shows us how to embrace the messy, beautiful reality. What makes a good parent?Can sibling relationships survive to adulthood?Should love within a family really be unconditional?Wherever, whenever and however you learnt about family, it's likely that you have unshakeable answers to these questions. In this revelatory new book, family researcher Lucy Blake shows that, whatever your assumptions are, they are almost certainly wrong and probably doing damage to your closest relationships.Blake looks at how the expectations we have affect and even hinder our interactions with parents, siblings, relatives and our children. Drawing on her experience of interviewing hundreds of family members – of all backgrounds – she explores these unrealistic ideas, exposes the truth of what a family really is and explains how we can better understand and appreciate the one we have.No Family Is Perfect is a fascinating examination of the messy and beautiful reality of family life, and a look at how we can change our beliefs about family for the better and maybe even enjoy Christmas.'Provides a fresh context for exploring issues that engage us throughout our lives... No Family is Perfect will change how we think and write about families'Terri Apter, author of Difficult Mothers and The Sister Knot

This two-volume, edited collection lays the groundwork for an international exploration of incarceration and generation, covering a range of geographic, judicial and administrative contexts of incarceration from contributors across a range of subjects. Volume II examines intergenerational relations issues within contexts of incarceration. It focuses on the intergenerational continuities in imprisonment; intergenerational justice and citizenship; the impacts of incarceration on multiple generations and within families; and media representations of the intergenerationality of incarceration. Volume I explores an array of experiences, dynamics, cultures, interventions, and impacts of incarceration in different generations. This collection speaks to academics in criminology, sociology, psychology, and law, and to practitioners and policymakers interested in incarceration.

European countries have faced profound changes in family structures and family forms over the last few decades. This volume provides insights from eleven European countries with varying welfare state arrangements, exploring the extent to which the intergenerational transmission of attitudes, resources and values matter with regard to the economic self-sufficiency of young people. Drawing on in-depth interviews with three generations of family members, the contributors show how intergenerational transmission happens and what the effects of these transmission processes are. The book reveals that family members serve as role models to younger family members and influence their career and educational aspirations, and that there are specific family value orientations and parental approaches which support economic self-sufficiency in younger generations. Intergenerational Transmission of Economic Self-Sufficiency will be of interest to students and scholars across a range ofdisciplines including social work, sociology, psychology and political sociology.

This book provides a comprehensive review of how digital communication technology can help families network and communicate across generations, despite differences in family composition, residential location, cultural values and orientations. Covering the full spectrum of intergenerational relations (including child to parent, and parent to grandparent), it offers a positive view of the value of digital technology usage within families.The author focuses on three European countries: Finland, Italy and Slovenia, but also touches on other European countries and parts of the United States, revealing evidence that challenges ideas of universal adoption of information communication technology (ICT) and consistency in the social effects of such adoption in different regions and cultures. Further, the book discusses numerous other challenges and issues, such as:• the social transformations and technological developments that have made digitalfamilies possible;• the resulting changes in family roles, responsibilities, and practices; and• the theoretical and conceptual implications of digital communication-technology use in families.The author illustrates how ICT can facilitate family solidarity and how it helps to provide new ways of being together, and they discuss how social media, particularly instant messaging applications, helps develop affinity between family members better than traditional one-to-one personal communication tools. Combining highly nuanced material with fresh sociological thinking, it enhances readers'theoretical understanding of the meaning of the ‘digital family', making it a powerful resource for graduate and undergraduate students, as well as academics. Thanks to its structured format with easy-to-understand explanations, it appeals to practitioners and researchers alike.

This volume addresses children and young people's relationships both within and beyond the context of the family. It begins with familial relationships and the home by examining the social and cultural complexities of families, intimacies and interdependencies, including the dynamics of families as spatial units (nuclear, multi-generational, alternative) and the roles that children play (as carers etc.). In addition to considering child/parent relations, sibling relationships and birth order, the initial section includes particular dimensions of children's familial relationships in diverse contexts, such as family food practices, aspirations and work practices. The second section explores geographical dimensions of adult/child relationships beyond the dynamics of the family and across the lifecourse. It considers the roles that intergenerationality plays in children's and young people's lives as well as their links with wider communities. The section addresses broader conceptual issues and themes (child-adult relationships outside the home; intergenerational geographies and spaces; and the intergenerational city) while also providing more focused discussions of current issues related to the geographies of intergenerationality including adoption, looked after children and fertility. The final section addresses children and young people's relationships with one another: friendship, peer group relations, and sexualities. It explores the geographies and spatialities of affective relations and emotional practices among children and young people. Geographies of bodies and embodiment and their connection to identities is an important part of this section. The chapters range from cross-cultural comparisons of age mixing among children to specific kinds of relationship formations between children and young people (e.g. friendship; sexual relations; gangs; bullying) and the spaces and places (including cyberspace) that facilitate, impede and organise these relationships. The diverse relationships that children and young people form with both one another and with adults have significant geographical dimensions.

This volume explores intergenerational practices and their impact on social sustainability, with an emphasis on developing programmatic efforts to address profound social challenges such as underperforming educational and work-related systems, failing support systems for dependent or vulnerable populations, and community renewal and regeneration efforts. To this end, the core argument is to present issues related to age, aging, and generations, not only as problems, but as catalysts to facilitate improved quality of life for all generations.For societies to be sustainable, all generations must coexist at any given time and across time (non-contemporary generations). Hence, the ultimate vision presented here is one of intergenerational sustainability as both a conceptual tool and as a call for action. Intergenerational pathways are introduced as strategies for improving health and well-being across the lifespan, strengthening families, improving under-performing educational and work-related systems, and helping to build more cohesive, caring communities. Reviewing some of the historical factors and developments influencing intergenerational studies, as well as presenting regional case studies and comparative research, this book presents successful models that may be applied to everyday multigenerational practices in institutions such as education, family life, housing, healthcare, employment, and community development. The result is an accessible resource for students, academics, policymakers, community leaders, and citizens concerned with creating opportunities amidst challenging demographic and social changes.

This life-course analysis of family development focuses on the social dynamics among family members. It features parent-child relationships in a larger context, by examining the help exchange between kin and nonkin and the intergenerational transmission of family characteristics.

This book makes a major contribution to our understanding of 21st century families in Britain through an exploration of intergenerational relationships. Drawing on new and extensive quantitative and qualitative research, the authors explore the giving and receiving of financial gifts. Despite growing concern about intergenerational tension and even possible conflict, the book finds evidence of a significant degree of intergenerational solidarity both within families at the micro level and between generations more generally within society at the macro level in Britain. However, given substantial inequalities within different generations as a result, in particular, of social class divisions, some families are able to support each other far more than others. This means that strong intergenerational solidarity may lead to the entrenchment of existing intragenerational inequalities. The book will be of interest to scholars and students researching Sociology, Social Policy, Family Sociology, Generations and Intergenerational Relationships.

Recent literature has identified modern “parenting” as an expert-led practice—one which begins with pre-pregnancy decisions, entails distinct types of intimate relationships, places intense burdens on mothers and increasingly on fathers too. Exploring within diverse historical and global contexts how men and women make—and break—relations between generations when becoming parents, this volume brings together innovative qualitative research by anthropologists, historians, and sociologists. The chapters focus tightly on inter-generational transmission and demonstrate its importance for understanding how people become parents and rear children.

Drawing on interviews and focus groups with young mothers and fathers, their parents and other relatives, this book provides a rich exploration of the experience of being a teenage parent now, and for earlier generations, closely examining teenage pregnancy and parenting in families where two or more generations have been teenage mothers. Brown also explores the cultural and social contexts of teenage parenting by including the views of people who have many years'experience of working with young parents in health, social and welfare settings. The book challenges policy contexts which focus on negative aspects of teenage parenting, and shows that for many young people, parenting can be a positive experience. It will appeal to academics, policymakers and professionals with an interest in teenage pregnancy and parenting.

Familiäre Beziehungen sind doppelgesichtig: Es sind Liebes- und Machtbeziehungen, Beziehungen ohne Berechnung und doch wird aufgerechnet, persönliche Beziehungen, die einer starken Moralisierung unterliegen. Wie äußert sich der „Eigensinn des Familialen“, wenn die Generationenbeziehungen in einer Krise unter Druck geraten: Wenn erwachsene Söhne und Töchter (wieder) bei den Eltern leben und von ihnen unterstützt werden müssen, weil sie erwerbslos sind und nicht in der Lage, auf eigenen Beinen zu stehen. Oder wenn Eltern pflegebedürftig werden und die Kinder, die ihr eigenes Leben haben, mit der Aufgabe konfrontiert sind, sich um sie zu kümmern. Wie erleben die betroffenen Eltern und Kinder die Situation, wie gehen sie damit um und welche Probleme und Konflikte sind damit verbunden. Diese Fragen stehen im Mittelpunkt des Buches, das sich auch als ein Beitrag zur Erforschung familialer Beziehungen versteht, ein Thema, das in den letzten Jahren etwas aus dem Blickfeld der Soziologie geraten ist.

The dominant cultural script is that the Baby Boomers have'had it all', thereby depriving younger generations of the opportunity to create a life for themselves. Bristow provides a critical account of this discourse by locating the problematisation of the Baby Boomers within a wider ambivalence about the legacy of the Sixties.

This book examines ways to ensure that the rights, interests and concerns of young people are properly represented in Western democracies. One new proposal is the introduction of youth quotas in political institutions in order to counter the possible marginalization of young people caused by demographic ageing and, thereby, an overrepresentation of the interests of the elderly.The book explores key questions regarding the implementation of youth quotas from different perspectives, including philosophy, political science, sociology and demography. It examines whether youth quotas and other measures that give the young more voice and influence in political institutions are a good means for promoting the cause of intergenerational justice. In particular, it investigates how and if youth quotas can be used to ensure that the environmental interests of young and future generations are being taken into account.In addition, the book introduces an innovative model that would give a right to vote to minors without voting age boundaries. The book also discusses suffrage reforms through lowering the voting age in Western countries, as well as introducing methods especially aimed at raising the skills of children necessary for societal citizenship and empowerment of young citizens.The volume will help raise awareness and knowledge about the intergenerational implications of demographic changes in Western democracies, where ageing societies are increasingly turning into gerontocracies. It offers readers deep insight into how youth quotas in particular (and others forms of youth participation in general) might be efficient methods to ensure that younger generations are included in the political decision making process and other activities in society.