The Changing Family

1. The Changing Family Kristen Ruiz Briana Simoes Astrid Ramirez Alix

2. Premarital Sex and Marriage • After 1850, the middle class cared more about increasing their financial standing through marriage than the working class. -young women were watched more frequently then young men in order to keep them from having premarital sex. -the daughter virginity was treated as a financial opportunity. • Premarital sex and romantic ideals were common among the working among the working class. • Reasons being -could not afford prostitutes -no hope of improving societal rank through marriage

3. Continued.. • Between 1750 and 1850 the rates of illegitimacy soared -not as common in industrialized cities • In the later 19th century more pregnant women were marrying. - they would establish a two parent household. -improved the working class respectability.

4. Prostitution • Prostitution was a stage in life. • Men of all classes visited prostitutes. -middle upper classes had more money to sustain this lifestyle. • In Paris alone, 155,000 women were registered as prostitutes between 1871 and 1903. - About 750,000 other women were suspected of prostitution in the same years. • Both regular and part-time prostitutes quote their prices. -Working class women were corrupted by hot meals and baths. • My Secret Life, an anonymous eleven-volume autobiography of an English sexual adventurer from the servant-keeping classes. -reveals the dark side of sex and class in urban society. -frequently, thinking of their wives in terms of money, family, and social position.

5. Kinship Ties • In working-class homes, ties to relatives after marriage were called kinship ties. -much stronger than many social observers had recognized. • After marriage, in the working class it was common for the newly weds to live near the rest of the family. -Reasons being: • Support during sickness, a death, unemployment, or old age • Many large families often lived in the same neighborhood. • People turned to their families for help in coping with sickness, unemployment, death, and old age. • Government was generally providing more welfare services -the average couple and its children inevitably faced crisis.

6. Gender Role and Family Life • After 1850, more women were staying home while the husband earned the wages. -factory employment for women declined -women only worked outside the home in poor households. • Gender division led to discrimination when a women wanted to work -well paying jobs were off limits -husbands were disapproving • In working-class homes, ties to relatives after marriage were called kinship ties. -much stronger than many social observers had recognized. • Women lacked basic legal rights -not allowed to own property -wives wages belonged to their husbands -led to rebellion

7. Cont.. • 1882: law gave English women property rights. -socialists women frowned upon liberal feminists • Women in the home were given the wages to manage. -gave the husband a small allowance. • By 1900, life revolved around the home and family for all social classes.

8. Child Rearing • The financially stable classes began to develop actual affection for their infants • -women became better mothers • -breast feeding • Nurturing applied to their older children too. (teens and what not) • Considered the input in their children could come out positively economically. • Overprotection sprang from this idea: • -girls could not ride horses or do such things like riding bicycles • -this was viewed as masturbation • Boys trousers had to be a certain fit. -Parents didn’t want anything sexual occurring.