ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the family lifestyles in an Arab urban community in Israel. It demonstrates the importance of intensive community-level studies for the investigation of family patterns. The comprehensive survey has been an effective way of deriving data on the basic characteristics of the family and the community. The participant observation and the conversations were aimed mainly at supporting in-depth data about several points regarding family patterns and the nature of the interaction among the different groups in the community. During the agrarian period, there were several social classes in Shefar-A'm: the merchant and the large landowners, the modest landowners, the small landowners, and the landless. In the pre-1948 period, the relationships of the population of Shefar-A'm with the surrounding communities in the region had considerable repercussions on the group and the family life. It is clear that the particular conditions in Shefar-A'm are unique and the constellation of factors are specific to Arab communities in Israel.
