Modern Types of Families - Essay Example

I also believe that current family organizations are loosely connected with only a few relatives being able to identify with each other. The transition in American and the rest of the world families was influenced by the invention of farming. This changed the people’s way of life from hunters and gathers to a more settled life where they provided a workforce in the farms. Farming changed the lives of people to a more organized family unit as compared to the scattered life they used to live before.

This form of life gave them a sense of family identity (Alvin and Toffler, 596). The family units were so big that they included distant relatives, friends and even strangers. The number of children in each family was greater than the old people and the lifestyle encouraged people to sire more children. This was also very important and was considered as part of wealth through family labor. It gave people status in the society since the more children one had the more he or she was respected. This form of settlement was polygamous and men were respected in terms of the number of wives they had.

People performed similar jobs since there were limited opportunities which were mainly farming (Samuels, 114). I believe this kind of settlement was necessary because families were sources of cheap labor and the more family members they were the more the production and hence increasing wealth for the family. The next transition was characterized by the emergence of industries. People settled in small family units as white collar workers and had small family units. Marriage was respected during that era and women played the role of housewives (Alvin and Toffler, 59).

Men worked in the industries to provide for their families. Family sizes reduced drastically as people moved to urban areas where there were industries. Also, education was valued and children started attending local schools. The families were mainly composed of father, mother and a few children.