Changes of American Family: From the Point of Women’s Roles

给大家推荐一篇关于Changes of American Family: From the Point of Women’s Roles的优秀paper范文。作为一个中国人，我们大多数对美国家庭的总体看法大多来自对书籍或电视剧的描述。当谈到一个标准的家庭时，我脑海中涌动的大多数想法都是一个父亲、一个母亲和他们的孩子或孩子的集合，不管是中国人还是美国人。父亲肩负着养家糊口的责任，母亲则承担着家务劳动和服务家庭的责任。在过去的二十年里，事情发生了变化，而人们的传统思想却没有改变。然而，生活和让生活，正如俗话所说，人们对不同的家庭形式越来越包容。从许多电视连续剧来看，都有一些变化的线索需要追踪。我想从女性在家庭中的角色角度来分析这一现象

As a Chinese, my general views about American families mostly come from the descriptions of books or TV series. When talking about a standard family, most thoughts flood in my mind is a collection of a father, a mother and their child or children, no matter it’s a Chinese one or an American one. Father shoulders the responsibility of raising the whole family while mother does housework and serves the whole family. During the last two decades, things change while people’s traditional thoughts don’t. However, live and let live, as the saying goes, people are becoming more and more inclusive about different family format. From many TV series, there are clues of changes to track. I want to analyze this phenomenon from the perspective of women’s role in a family.
Take Growing Pains for example. The Seavers is a family live on Long Island. Jason and Maggie is a couple who has been married for 15 years and has three children including a daughter and two sons. They kiss each other when the children are leaving for school. We can see that this family cares a lot about the intimacy between every family member. Kissing is like a ceremony, or a symbolic of love. That’s why little Ben return home unhappily and thought there’s something wrong in the family only for not having a kiss on his broken arm. Maggie has always been a housewife after marriage. When she finally decided to back to her career, she still can’t put family chores down and worried about every little thing. Maybe she is just used to being a housewife and deal with those things, or maybe she unconsciously accepted the idea that a woman should be responsible for everything at home.
Difficulties for women like Maggie of coming back to career not only come from finding a proper job, but also from psychological pressure of social views. In those years the traditional view of division of labor in society indicates that men are stronger than women and should do more works while women are not able to perform as well as men, which is the main reason that many women had to remain a housewife and serve her husband and her children. This being the case, a woman tends to devote all her life to the family while her husband work outside and meet other people. It’s not hard to imagine that this kind of family is not stable because they hardly have same topics and same social circles. However, because the traditional views can’t accept divorcing as well as later on, the divorce rate is relatively low. Women are inferior in this kind of relationship and she has to serve the family heart and soul. Because once she gets divorced, she doesn’t have any sources of income.
As time passes family formats in TV series are diverse. In Friends, for instance, Monica and Chandler adopted two babies, Phoebe even gave birth to three babies for her brother as a surrogate mother, while Rachel and Ross had a baby without getting married. About the last example, I was quite shocked about this plot because I always thought a couple should be married first and then have babies. I couldn’t accept this until I saw a comment, that people should get married on condition that they are in love with each other. It may be a better idea for their baby to have single parent than to live in a family filled with quarrel and fight. When Rachel decided to get back to work, Ross didn’t say anything opposite, and Rachel didn’t think that’s improper at all, which is different from Maggie.
Women are getting more and more dependent. From the perspective of the society, single mother like Rachel can also work in an office in Ralph Lauren’s and earn a living for her and her baby. Women can also be managers and in charge of some employees. They have higher status in not only society but also family. Women and men share housework, which indicates that they also get respect from other family members. They work for a better life for themselves rather than for their husband. They have material support from themselves to chase after personality and better fate. That’s why women have the courage to face divorcing.
However, when Rachel and Ross were both too busy to take care of Emma, Rachel had to take Emma to work rather than Ross. This means that women still have to solve family issues more than men. Then there’s another show How I Met Your Mother, which depicts a more modern picture of family. Lily and Marshall is a married couple and they had a baby. When Lily got strapped by other things and cannot go to Marshall’s hometown, Marshall took their son by himself. They spent a long period together and audience can see what a great Dad Marshall is. That’s a perfect family relationship with both parents all try their best to keep a sweet home. Women and men in the family have total equal status. They form a family simply out of love, which is in contrast with the old days that a woman only wants to find a man to rely on and a man just wants to find a woman to serve him.
One of my friends Kirtland is a single mother with a lovely daughter. She got married for two years and got divorced because she couldn’t stand the man’s cheating. When I ask her if she feels hard to raise a child only by herself, she laughed and said yes, sometimes, but that’s something she has to bear. She also told me that she doesn’t want to live a life as her mother does. They have quarrels all the time but they can’t accept the idea of getting divorced which they think it would be a shame. Now she has a boyfriend and they have a stable relationship. Once I asked her if she worries that the man may not be able to regard her daughter as his own child, she said that’s where the significance of dating lies. She needs to make sure during this period that this man is suitable for her and her daughter. The word “suitable” stroke my heart. I suddenly realize the most important thing about a family is that it contains several people that are suitable for each other. Therefore, no matter what you have been through outside in school or at work, you can always get relaxed at home, where you belong to. In the past, a woman chooses her husband based on if this man can provide me comfortable life rather than if this man has the personality and characteristics that I like. The woman may be suitable for what the man can provide, but not suitable for the man himself.
As the dictionary goes, family is a group who are related to each other, especially parents and their children. As time goes by, a family contains people who may not have blood relationships. Single parents, reconstituted families and gay couples are being more and more accepted. As the statistics of Bureau of the Census indicates, the age of women get married are becoming higher. Even if they get married, there are still about 50% chances they will get divorced. More couples are choosing not having children. Most of these changes actually come from the improvement of the status of women. They create a new psychological atmosphere, which is good for both the couple. With a developing standpoint, family members are becoming more independent and not as much bound by family as before. Family seems to have less importance in people’s mind. They prefer to devote themselves more in other areas such as career and hobbies. But till now, family is still the main driving force for shaping personality, shaping value and prompting people to seize opportunities.
As far as I concern, family is a personal thing that shouldn’t be bothered by other people. Everyone has the right to chase after happiness, including women. With the law permitting, people can do choices that are better for their lives. For instance, although the divorcing rate is getting higher there years, there is no statistics indicate that people are getting less happy. People need to be more inclusive. A nation is composed of thousands of families. Only when people get harmonious family can they construct a harmonious society.