ABSTRACT
Although most adults may have a common-sense understanding of ‘the family’ there is much debate in social science about the meaning and indeed usefulness of the term itself (Bernardes, 1985; Trost, 1990). Radical changes in how adults live together and raise children have shaken received wisdom concerning definitions of the family. Humpty Dumpty has fallen off the wall and his fragments cannot be reassembled in quite the same way (Laslett, 1991). In the latter part of the twentieth century new words have been created to describe the diversity of families that are emerging-oneparent family, bi-nuclear family, network family, reconstituted family, blended familyleading some to call for more precision in the use of ‘family words’.
