1. Family
The family in general is a group based on marriage and marriage contact including recognitions of the rights and duties of parenthood, common residence for husband and wife and children as well as reciprocal, economic obligation between husband and wife.

2. Family is a micro unit of social system.
Family is an institute of social system.
Family is a key of social system.
An institution is a part of social system

3. Definition of Family:  
A Family is a social and economic unit consisting minimally of one or more parents and their children – Ember and Ember.
“A family is a social group characterized by common residence, economics co-operation and reproduction”- Mardock
“Family is a group based on material relation rights and duties and parenthood, common habitations and reciprocal relation between parents and children – Robert Lowie.
Family is cross- Cultural perspectives” – Stefens  

4. Some common features of family:
1. A matting relationship (mating)
2. Form of marriage according to which the mating relation is established and maintained.   3. System of economic system or group having duties and oblige.
4. A common habitation of home or house hold.

5. Functions of family: Divided in two types: A. Essential functions:
 1)     Sexual  2)     Reproduction and maintain of the children   3)     Placement  4)     Socialization

6. B. Non-essential functions:
 1)     Economy  2)     Education  3)    Religious  4)     Health and recreation  5)     Care of aged
  6)     Political control

7. 7)     Physical Protection  8)     Social  9)    Cultural.

8. INTIMATE RELATIONSHIPS and types of family
Nuclear Family: nucleus or core upon which larger family groups are built
The term nuclear family can be defined simply as a wife/mother, a husband/father, and their children.

9. Extended Family: family in which relatives such as grandparents, aunts, or uncles live in same home as parents and their children.
Joint Family: The social unit consisting of several generations of kindred living together under the same roof or in a joining compound. Traditionally, joint families live in a large single home, but in modern times accommodations are often in individual, nuclear homes within a shared compound. The joint family includes the father and mother, sons, grandsons and great-grandsons with their spouses, as well as the daughters, granddaughters and great-granddaughters until they are married - thus often comprising several married couples and their children.

10. Monogamy: form of marriage in which one woman and one man are married only to each other.
Serial Monogamy: when a person has several spouses in his or her lifetime, but only one spouse at a time

11. Polygamy: when an individual has several husbands or wives simultaneously
Polygyny: marriage of a man to more than one woman at a time
Polyandry: marriage of a woman to more than one husband at the same time.

12. Rules of descent Kinship Patterns: To Whom Are We Related?.
Kinship: state of being related to others
Bilateral Descent: both sides of a person’s family are regarded as equally important
Patrilineal descent: only the father’s relatives are important
Matrilineal descent: only the mother’s relatives are significant

13. Authority Patterns: Who Rules?
Patriarchy: males are expected to dominate in all family decision making
Matriarchy: women have greater authority than men
Egalitarian family: family in which spouses are regarded as equals

14. Marital residence
Patrilocal-A family system in which the wife is expected to live with the Husband’s parents.
Matrilocal-A family system in which the husband is expected to live with the wife's parents.
Neo-local-A kinship arrangement in which married couples start new households
Avunculocal-Avunculocal residence is generated from a number of separate rules

15. Women usually take up residence with their husbands after marriage, and the couple's children reside with them until adulthood.
Upon reaching maturity, sons are expected to move out of their parental home into their mothers' brothers' households.
Daughters continue to follow a virilocal pattern, by moving to their husbands' households after marriage.

16. Avunculocal Residence, Stage I
In the initial stages of household development, a married couple resides in the husband's household, as do their young children (B and C). At this point the domestic unit assumes the form of a nuclear family.

17. Avunculocal Residence, Stage II
In the next generation, the children of the family, B and C, leave their natal household. The son (B) join's his mother's brother, and the daughter (C) joins her husband. In the same vein, A's adult sister's son (D) moves in with him and eventually marries and brings in his wife. D's young children reside with their mother and father until adulthood. (Note that matrilineally related kin are shaded in the same coulour.

18. Studying the Family Functionalist View 1. Reproduction 2. Protection
Family serves six functions for society:
1. Reproduction
2. Protection
3. Socialization
4. Regulation of sexual behavior
5. Affection
6. Providing of social status

19. Conflict View
Family reflects inequality in wealth and power found within society
Throughout human history, husbands have exercised power and authority within the family
View the family as an economic unit contributing to social injustice

20. Interactionist view
Interactionist focus on the micro-level of family and other intimate relationships. They are interested in how individuals interact with one another in different types of families and relationships..