ABSTRACT
Family issues have had a chequered history in sociology in the second half of the twentieth century (see Chapter 7), and while such issues may appear to have been receiving greater attention in recent years, much of this interest has not been framed in terms of ‘family’ at all. Family sociology has thus tended to shift into a sociology of relationships and intimacy, in the process attracting attention from some prominent mainstream sociological theorists, notably Anthony Giddens (1991, 1992) and Ulrich Beck and Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim (1995). However, this concern with intimacy neglects relationships between parents and children (Smart 1997; Jamieson 1998), a neglect that has important gendered implications for the sort of sociology we produce. Relationships with their children not only shape women’s working lives and life trajectories but also relate to significant social experiences centred on childrearing activities – what feminist writers have tended to refer to as the ‘private’ sphere.
