La famiglia negli studi sociologici classici e contemporanei

Abstract

The family has been a specific object of sociological study since the early days of sociology, that is, when the founding fathers of the discipline—beginning in the late 19th century—driven by the desire to question the world and to interpret the social changes brought about by epochal phenomena such as industrialization, the development of capitalism, and urbanization, set themselves, among other goals, the task of studying the transformations of family structures and reflecting on the fate and future of this institution. A further boost to the study of the family emerged alongside the crisis of traditional historiography, typical of the 19th and 20th centuries, when interest in the private sphere, in everyday life, and in the stories from below—elements that traditional historiography had not deemed worthy of attention—breathed new life into family analysis. Other significant theoretical and empirical contributions have treated the family as a social, political, symbolic, and relational space, as well as explored the changes in subjectivities and the connection between cultural processes and the practices of human existence.