Chapter 11 – Dimensions of Diversity
Start with an episode of Modern Family on ABC
- Emphasize the diversity and variation in family forms
- This demonstrates the variation in family forms that exists across families, even white
families
- Race and ethnicity provide a whole different dimension of diversity in family forms
- Two of your readings in Chapter 11 focus on family forms for race/ethnic groups
Major “take aways” from this chapter (Readings 32 and 33 in particular):
 Families come in all different shapes, sizes and forms

Families do not operate in a vacuum – this is one of the major reasons why they come in every
size, shape and form imaginable

There are larger structural forces (social, economic, cultural) impacting families; in order to
understand the diversity in family forms, you need to explore these structural forces
o Baca Zinn and Wells conceptual framework (reading 33) lays this out very nicely – pp.
446-448
o They argue that families are the products of social forces
o Read second full paragraph under “Conceptual Framework” p. 446
o Baca Zinn and Wells examine three macrostructural conditions that produce family
variation across Latino groups in particular, but these conditions impact all families and
can explain variation in lots of family forms:
 The sociohistorical context
 The structure of economic opportunity
 Global reorganization, including economic restructuring and immigration
o
Example from Taylor’s reading on African American families – pp. 430 – 434 – Marriage,
Divorce and Separation, single parent families, etc.
 Trends
 African Americans are marrying at a much later age than persons of
other races
 Increase in never married among African Americans
 Increase in single parents families – true for all families, even higher rate
among African American families
 African American families (women in particular) slower to get divorce
even if no longer living with spouse
 Fewer African American women remarrying than white women
 Explanations for these trends
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Continued high rates of unemployment, especially among young men –
economic changes making African American men in particular even “less
marriageable”
College attendance
Military service
Extended period of cohabitation prior to marriage
Unbalanced sex ratio – shortage of men due partly to high mortality and
incarceration of African American men – “the marriage squeeze”
Primacy of blood ties and extended family – read p. 433 underlined

There is variation in the way people experience family
o Baca Zinn and Wells argue on p. 447 (bottom) – “People of the same national origin may
experience family differently, depending on their location in the class structure as
unemployed, poor, working class or professional; their location in the gender structure
as female or male; and their location in the sexual orientation system as heterosexual,
gay, lesbian, or bisexual (Baca Zinn and Dill 1996).”

Families that have not fit the “white middle class” mold have been marginalized in American
society and seen as problematic – all of which has only contributed to the “decline of family”
debate and perpetuated the myth of universality - that all families are the same everywhere or
that they should be
o So when family forms or experiences deviated from the “white middle class” form or
experience, family social scientist studied them as “deviants”
o Baca Zinn and Wells point to the way immigrant families became targets for social
reform – p. 444
 Mexican families were seen as disorganized, at odds with the social
requirements of the new setting, as cultural exceptions
o Taylor – p. 422-423 – points to researchers taking a “deficit approach” or “pathology
approach” to understanding African American families
 These models understood African American families as deviant, inferior,
“unnatural” and problematic – needing to be fixed
 Then there was a move toward a “cultural variant” approach to understanding
African American families – which at least took into consideration the resilience
and adaptiveness of African American families under a variety of social
economic conditions – p. 423 – but this perspective still marginalized African
American families as different – functional, but different

Our narrow definition of family in the past has limited our understanding of families in the US
and individual’s experiences within those families. We need to think of families in broader
terms to be more inclusive of all family forms and experiences. We need to think of families as
dynamic units that are forever changing with the changes in the larger social structure.
o

Baca Zinn says it best – p. 448 – “Families should be seen as settings in which people are
agents and actors, coping with, adapting to, and changing social structures to meet their
needs.”
We don’t need policies to make families all the same, we need policies that help families
survive; policies that minimize the negative impact of some of the larger structural factors for
families
o For example, Taylor is suggesting several reforms to policy to help address the high
levels of female headed households among poor African Americans and the decline in
marriages among African Americans – p. 439
 Reinstate welfare
 Need programs to address health concerns
 Improve education
 Economic labor market strategy – improve the economic and employment
prospects of African Americans’ in this changing economic structure
 Raise education level of youth
 Increase employment training
 Enforce anti-discrimination laws
 Rebuild social and economic infrastructure of inner cities

DISCUSSION QUESTION: Are any of your agencies with whom you are working
this semester through your service-learning projects trying to address any of
these concerns for ethnic minority families? Or families at the lower end of our
stratification system? How? Or why not?
Reading 32 – Diversity within African American Families
Taylor
Reading 33 – Diversity within Latino Families: New Lessons for Family Social Science
Baca Zinn and Wells