From Generation to Generation

This book applies various social approaches to investigations of real people as they function in a specific context, the family. Of all the social facts we construct, identity is probably the most critical. And of all our identities, cultural identity is one of the most central to who we think we are. We learn our cultural identities first within families. The authors all examine the families they know best, their own. The chapters examine four critical issues: how family members jointly work to construct identity; how parents convey that identity to their children; the conflict between mainstream expectations and the traditions of discrete cultural groups; and the range of possible ways to display identity within and across groups.