A Study On The American Family Crisis In The Second Half Of The 20th Century

In the second half of the 20th century,along with the United States various social movements, the traditional social norm is under the violent impact.Marriage and family is not as strong as ever, divorce rates rise sharply,single-parent families appear massively,adults' gender relationship disorders,the unmarried birth and teenage pregnancy increases sharply,gay marriage rampages, fertility declines,the American family's fissure is getting deeper and deeper.The focus of scholars' investigation and academic debate is how to change American's views on marriage and family.The problems of the American family caused by the American's economic,political and social ideological factors,however,many scholars just use the sociology,the psychology,the anthropology and the population statistics to studies the American family issues,few using the historical view to explain the reasons for the problem.In view of this,how to use historical perspective to study the social background and practical factors of the American families crisis,and how to analysis its characteristics and effects,is the primary intention of this paper.The full text is divided into five chapters:The first chapter is a preface,elaborates the selected topic reason to the article,and recalls this topic's research situation of domestic and foreign scholars in the 20th century.The second chapter,According to the general view of domestic and foreign scholars,the author defines the meaning of the American family crisis,and descript their specific performance through a large number of official data,namely:divorce rates sharp rise,single-parent families appear massively,adult gender relationship disorders,the unmarried birth and teenage pregnancy increases sharply,gay marriage get legitimized and fertility rates decline.The third chapter is the core of this paper,which studies the reason to the American family crisis in the second half of the 20th century,including economic,political,legal,social,and ideological aspect.Economical,industrialization and urbanization speeds up after World Warâ…¡, which causes the women get employed widely and expands their choice right in marriage and family. They not only oppose the old concept of family ethics,but also oppose all the behavior and concept which against women.Their world outlook,life outlook and family concept has fundamental changed,becoming a catalyst to facilitates the other family member role to change.Meanwhile,the society takes over family's functions excessively,education,leisure,consumption and so on don't take the family as the unit,even "from cradle to grave" has special services.Politically,the "Counter-cultural Movement" out broke in 1960s,the author just studies its several major movement, which impacts the American families crisis deeply,such as the women's liberation movement,sexual liberation movement and the Gay Rights Movement.Legal aspects,the most importance is the "No-fault divorce law" has brought unexpected economic and social consequences to the American women and children;at the same time,Mediation divorce system and the American law has many loopholes which aggravate the family crisis.Socially,Young people can't get the right sex education from family and school,which further impacts young people's physical and mental health.At the same time,the American society is leaded by advertising and television severely;the entertainment is an essential part of life.Under the "nurtured" of mass media,many young people fall into astray. Finally,American culture take the Individualism,the ultra-Liberalism,Hedonism and Consumerism as the main characteristic,which have initiated "the new ideological trend" and "the new idea", confused marital relations and gender relations seriously.What's more,their family view and marital view has changed from the mid-1960s.They think divorce no longer regards as the life defeat or the shame symbol,but is praised for individual's new life,they also accept illegitimacy demonstrates personally honest and brave,the public opinion acknowledged and respect the homosexuality family, the single-parent family and so on,the traditional family pattern encounters the unprecedented impact.In short,the reason why there is a family crisis in the second half of the 20th century in America is the result of the combined effects of the series of factors.The forth chapter elaborated the disputes on the American family crisis among the domestic and foreign scholars,acknowledged the change of idea and the feebleness of family function are suit for society,and analyzed the negative effect which produced by family crisis.I support we should take a dialectical view using a historical perspective to the series of changes.We are not only recognizing the reasonable aspect,but also paying more attention to the various social problems which caused by this changes.The last chapter is the epilogue.It is the economy,political and the social consciousness combined produced the American family crisis.Now,the family issue has aroused the concern of many Americans,but how to treat and resolve these issues,there are still many differences in understanding,but also cannot put out the effective means to deal with the social impact which the crisis creates.The author appeals that The American government and society can take the effective action to save the American family crisis.