Definition of Family - Essay Example

It is also considered to be a basic and significant unit for bringing up children in a social manner. A family may be classified as a multifocal family in which a mother and the children are present, a conjugal family in which the husband, wife and their children from the members of the family and extended family in which apart from the parents and the children there are other members residing in the family who are originally the members of the parents in this family. A family in which only parents and their children live is called a nuclear family whereas extended families with a wide number of relationships are known as joint families.

Family is an important unit of socialization. The term family is used to refer to inclusive categories like nationhood, community, humanism and global villages. A family forms the basic unit for all these categories in a society. Family is also considered to be a significant economic unit which is widely studied under family economics. Many sociological and biological theories have been presented by different scholars to support the concept and evolution of family in the society from the starting of the human civilization till the present day.

The biological theory of evolution coined by Darwin is an important theory in the area of evolution of systems of family in the human societies. The concept of family has also evolved in phased of savagery barbarism and civilization as indicated by other anthropologists like Lewis H. Morgan. The concept of family as an important social unit has been recognized most widely in the civilization stage of human progress (Forbes 20). The transformation of the civilized society and a class based society from a primitive community is identified to have been largely driven by the evolution of family systems in the human societies.

The function and structure of families are said to depend largely on the