Marriage:
Marriage is a socially accepted joining of two people that establishes obligations and expectations or rights between the spouses (Allen & Jaramillo-Sierra 2015). It is a union sanctioned by society, traditionally between a man and a woman. Marriage operates based on customs, rules, and laws, with accompanying attitudes and beliefs that govern the interaction between the spouses, their families, and the wider community.
Functionalism Theory:
One of the theories on marriage is functionalism. People who subscribe to this theory state that family is an important social institution that plays a major part in bringing stability to society. This is because the family is the building block of society and stable families ensure stable societies (Hatch 2013). The members of a family also take on leadership roles in a marriage and the family. They also perform functions that benefit their families in particular and the community at large. Thus, by improving the living conditions and the general welfare of their families, they uplift the social standards of the entire community.
Sexuality and Intimacy:
In a society, the family has distinct functions. Most communities frowned on sex outside marriage, meaning that people could enjoy sex only after entering the institution of marriage. Sexual intercourse was hereby a strong motivator for people to get married. This is one of the reasons why in the past, people got married at a much younger age (Allen and Jaramillo-Sierra 2015). In a bid to help people maintain the strict requirement of abstaining from sex until after marriage, girls got married soon after entering puberty while the boys would be slightly older. Nowadays, the desire for the emotional connection as well as the physical release and intimacy sex provides is still a strong driving force for couples to get into intimate, romantic relationships.
Couples fulfill their sexual needs in marriage, thereby ensuring mutual sexual satisfaction and hence personal wellbeing. This factor maintains the regulation of sexual relations and the family offers a socially acceptable sexual outlet for the couple (Jackson et al. 2014). People may engage in extramarital and premarital sexual activity but marriage is a stabilizing institution and reduces cases of extramarital affairs.
Children and Continuation of Society:
One of the main outcomes of marriage is children. Marriage ensures the continuation of the society by producing children who carry on the culture of the family and the society in which they are born (Lavner et al. 2016). This guarantees the continuity of the community and its cultures. Previously, cases of people getting children out of wedlock were unheard of. The likelihood of this happening was also slim as many cultures expected people to engage in sexual relations only in the confines of marriage. Therefore, a couple could only procreate after getting married.
Parents are a child's first and primary teachers and this was much more of a factor in the past when there was no formal education or in cultures that did not have such education. It is parents' responsibility to educate their progeny in what is socially acceptable, hence providing children with moral, mental, and economic grounding (Lavner et al. 2016). Society socializes and cultures children and this makes them acceptable members of the community. They also learn about their culture and their cultural practices. As they mature, families help to initiate children into different age-sets in their community.
Gender Roles:
Children learn from their parents about the responsibilities they are expected to carry out based on their gender. These are called gender roles. Gender roles are important since they ensure the smooth running of the family in particular and the community at large, and they are either expressive or instrumental (Lindsey 2015). Men take on responsibilities that involve working outside the home and they provide financial support to their families. In the process, they lift the status of the family in the eyes of the community (Lindsey 2015). Their responsibilities are called instrumental roles.
Women undertake expressive or nurturing roles that involve working in the family or home. They provide emotional support for the family and take care of the children and other relatives or family members (Lindsey 2015). They maintain the home and create a welcome haven for the family. They are the primary caregivers of children, although they also engage in economic activities.
Economic Empowerment:
The family engages in different economic activities in order to sustain itself. These economic activities range from farming to specialized, artisan undertakings such as woodwork, pottery, metalwork, and trade. These activities provide the family with a livelihood and ensure that the needs of the community are met. Consequently, when a family prospers, the community benefits through the ripple effect (Hatch 2013). It is the responsibility of parents to inculcate work ethics in their children thus helping the community economically. Thus, another function of marriage is economic empowerment.
Power Dynamics and Conflict:
Families are bastions of power where parents exercise power over their children in directing the children's conduct. Parents inculcate mores and instill family and social traditions and cultural norms in their children in order to shape them into responsible, well-behaved members of the family and the community (Lavner et al. 2016). This training is of utmost importance as the conduct of a child reflects on the parent, whether in a positive or negative manner and ultimately impacts on the wider society. Parents thereby wield power and exercise it to ensure they bring up children who make them proud. Oftentimes, children will resent this as they view it as an intrusion. They may feel or think they are old enough to make their own decisions or chart their own path, even when their parents disagree (Lindsey 2015). They may view their parents as overbearing and controlling, and this can lead to conflict.
Older and more powerful members of the family wield power over the younger and less powerful family members, and power usually depends on a person's access to resources (Lindsey 2015). This can lead to conflict as the younger people may think the older ones are old-fashioned and stuck in the past. The older family members may think the younger ones are not mature enough to entrust with more responsibilities or power (Noller and Callan 2015). This impasse can foster discord and lead to disagreements.
As men tended to work outside the home and were the first to engage in paid labor, they often exert more power than women, who engaged in housework, which is unpaid work. Conflicts tend to arise in this setup as one party may be aggrieved and experience feelings of being unappreciated even though the roles performed are strenuous and critical for the survival of the family (Lindsey 2015). Men may demean the contribution made by women as it has no monetary value while the women may resent the fact that their hard work is neither seen nor appreciated, thus brewing discord. Consequently, people who subscribe to the conflict theory conclude that marriages are bastions of conflict.
Symbolism and Community:
The family is also symbolic in society. Parenting represents a biological connection to the children, since parents who bring children to this world. It is also an emotional connection as children receive nurture from their parents (Noller and Callan 2015). As a result, parents represent the first authority figures with who children interact. They also symbolize culture and education since they are their children's first teachers.
Fatherhood symbolizes discipline and providence because fathers are usually the family's breadwinner. In most societies, fathers are the disciplinarians and they are the ones who discharge justice in the home. Their word is usually final and they thereby represent justice and order in the home (Lindsey 2015). They are the fulcrum on which their family's economic well-being depends, and they thus represent economic empowerment in the home. Mothers represent nurturing since they are the primary caregivers in the home. They take good care of their families and ensure that the home is comfortable. They nurse sick family members and offer comfort to those who are hurting and they play a pivotal role in making celebrations merry (Lindsey 2015). Mothers, therefore, symbolize comfort, nurture, care, and warmth.
Family's Influence on Society:
Family members have a part to play in ensuring the general well-being of the community. Good behavior in family members reflects well on the family. Well-balanced families enjoy a good status in the community and paint a good picture of the society. Society also acknowledges the importance of the roles family members play because they tend to influence and set the tone for what is acceptable social behavior (Allen and Jaramillo-Sierra 2015). As a result, families act as the society's ambassadors to the outside world.
Conclusion:
Marriage plays a myriad of crucial roles in the community, and stability in marriage and family life has a direct impact on that of the community. Family is the building block of society and consequently, the state of society mirrors that of marriage and the family. Using the functionalist perspective to analyze this institution, marriage appears as a pillar for the community regardless of the negative attitudes that other perspectives such as conflict theory attribute to it.
References
Allen, K. R. " Jaramillo-Sierra, A. L., 2015. Feminist Theory and Research on Family Relationships: Pluralism and Complexity. Sex Roles, 73(3-4), p. 93–99.
Hatch, M. J., 2013. Organization Theory: Modern, Symbolic, and Postmodern Perspectives. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Jackson, J. B., Miller, R. B., Oka, M. " Henry, R. G., 2014. Gender Differences in Marital Satisfaction: A Meta‐analysis. Journal of Marriage and Family, 76(1).
Lavner, J. A., Karney, B. R. " Bradbury, T. N., 2016. Does Couples' Communication Predict Marital Satisfaction, or Does Marital Satisfaction Predict Communication?. Journal of Marriage and Family, 78(3).
Lindsey, L. L., 2015. Gender Roles: A Sociological Perspective. 6th ed. Abingdon: Routledge.
Noller, P. " Callan, V., 2015. The Adolescent in the Family. London: Routledge.
