Sunday Emmanuel

@sundayemmanuel · 30 Oct 2021

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What is family

Family is the smallest unit of a social organization. It is a social group whose members are related by ancestry, marriage, or adoption and live together. The family is an important social unit because the structure of the family determines what goes on in society. In many societies it is the kin group and not a married couple and their children, that is the basic family unit.

Again, the family can be described as a close-knit group of people who care about and respect each other.
More fundamentally, families vary in their composition and their descent, residence, and authority patterns. Although the institution of marriage leads to the formation of the family yet, a family can be formed without marriage. It should be however noted that the structure of the family and the relationship between its members change as children are born, grow, and mature to set up their own families.


Forms of family

There are two forms of family structure. There are nuclear families and extended families. Though by marriage various forms of family structure can be found in different societies. In considering the various forms of family, three things must be taken into account. These include decent, residence, and authority.

Nuclear family: the concept of the family refers to different levels of social organization in different cultures. Many a family consist of Man, his wife, and children (unmarried). This type of family is called the nuclear family. It is the simplest form of family.
People may find themselves as a member of two nuclear families. First, an individual may belong to a nuclear family that consists of oneself and one's father, mother, and siblings which are known as a family of orientation. This is the family where one was born. Secondly, when one marries, members of a nuclear family that consist of oneself and one's spouse and children from the family of procreation.


Extended family: extended family consists of two or more nuclear families. For example, if a man's conjugal family is Joined to his father's conjugal family through him to form one extended family. The links, as well as the nuclear families, could be more than 2 and the numbers of persons involved could be very large. The extended family system in today's developing countries is related to the level of their economic development and that as this country continues to develop the present system of family organization we give way to nuclear family structure.
@Henkjan de Krijger #Family