ABSTRACT
TO DESCRIBE REALITY is never quite the simple task that it seems. At the very outset one encounters the problem that facts are dumb and never speak for themselves. One observes them and reports them always on the basis of an accepted theoretical position, and I observed the New Dubliners and their family system in the light of a general theory of social systems which has common currency among social scientists. 1 I did so quite consciously and for the very best of reasons; this theory seems to make the best scientific sense. At the same time, this concept of the social system is essentially the same as that in terms of which Arensberg and Kimball described and analysed the family system of rural Ireland. To apply it to the New Dubliners gives us a more continuous view and enables us to compare more closely their family life with that of the countrymen.
