The Changing Landscape of Work and Family in the American Middle Class Reports from the Field

by Rudd, Elizabeth; Descartes, Lara; Fricke, Tom; Montgomery, Alesia F.; Root, Lawrence S.; Young, Alford A., Jr.; Hoey, Brian A.; Kottak, Conrad P.; Pash, Diana M.; Daniel Barnes, Riché Jeneen; Winkler, Erin N.; Han, Sallie; Goodsell, Todd L.; Chen, Carolyn

• ISBN13: 9780739117392
• ISBN10: 0739117394
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-03-14
• Publisher: Lexington Books

Summary

This collection explores the dynamics of the modern, middle-class American family and its near-constant state of transition. The editors introduce the book by situating it within the context of work, family, and ethnographic research on middle-class families in the United States. Emerging and established scholars contributed chapters based on their original field research, following each chapter with a personal reflection on doing field work. The volume concludes with an original essay by Kathryn Dudley, an anthropologist who has spent decades studying the intersections of work, family, and class in American culture. As a whole, the volume highlights how culture shapes family life amid shifting social and economic landscapes. The authors, working in the fields of anthropology and sociology, observed daily life at workplaces and in homes, interviewing people about their work, their children, and their ideas about what makes a good family. They report on their fieldwork in essays rich with the detail of everyday life, revealing the fascinating diversity of American middle-class families through chapters about gay co-father families, African American stay-at-home mothers, first-time fathers, rural refugees from corporate America, well-off white mothers, Taiwanese immigrant churches, the fetal ultrasound, and more. The Changing Landscape of Work and Family in the American Middle Class is an excellent text for classes in anthropology, sociology, American culture, family studies, work and family, and gender studies.

Author Biography

Lara Descartes is assistant professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at the University of Connecticut.

Table of Contents

Changing Landscapes of Work and Family	p. 1
Intersections of Work and Family
Working Selves, Moral Selves: Crafting the Good Person in the Northern Plains	p. 17
Kitchen Conferences and Garage Cubicles: The Merger of Home and Work in a 24-7 Global Economy	p. 41
"We Pass the Baby Off at the Factory Gates": Work and Family in the Manufacturing Midwest	p. 61
The Work-Family Divide for Low-Income African Americans	p. 87
American Dreaming: Refugees from Corporate Work Seek the Good Life	p. 117
Patrolling the Boundaries of Childhood in Middle-Class "Ruburbia"	p. 141
The (Not So) Standard North American Family
Gay Family Values: Gay Co-Father Families in Straight Communities	p. 159
Black Women Have Always Worked: Is There a Work-Family Conflict Among the Black Middle Class?	p. 189
"It's Like Arming Them": African American Mothers' Views on Racial Socialization	p. 211
Seeing the Baby in the Belly: Family and Kinship at the Ultrasound Scan	p. 243
Stabilizing Influence: Cultural Expectations of Fatherhood	p. 265
Focused on the Chinese American Family: Chinese Immigrant Churches and Childrearing	p. 281
Choosing Chastity: Redefining the Sexual Double Standard in the Language of Choice	p. 301
Afterword
What Is a Family?	p. 319
About the Contributors	p. 327
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