Книги

The book takes a broad comparative approach to the theories analyzed, both in terms of the empirical examples used (from North America, Europe and Australia) and in the discussion of how old and new approaches interact with one another. Cheal argues that it is possible to make the sense contemporary family theory by analyzing its divisions as the result of different experiences of modernity. These experiences are described as lying along three axes: first, the opposition between social modernism and its anti-modernists critics; second, the ideological effects of contradictions within modernity itself; and the third, the emerging difference modernist idealism and post-modernist skepticism. Another major theme of the book is the profound impact of feminism on contemporary family studies, and how this has been the catalyst for so much rethinking of the subject in recent years.