What We Really Miss About The 1950s & Changing American Families

The common theme between the essays by a Stephanie Coonts, "What We Really Miss About the 1950s", and Judy Root Aulette, "Changing American Families", is the social unit called the family. Coonts, in her essay, takes a look back into the 1950s and proves that the family of that time was truly not as ideal as people today may believe by comparing statistics from the 50s with more recent decades. Aulette, in her essay, compresses the writings and studies by other scholars into a summery that examines the effect of class, race, and gender on the family.

It is difficult for me to be nostalgic of the 1950s since I was born much later then that time period, however, I will admit that I, like many others, viewed the 1950s as an ideal time to grow up in. This view which Coontz points out is due to the way the media portrayed that time period. I found it interesting that the media, according to Coontz, not only sent a message to its viewers of time through TV shows ("family sitcoms gave people nightly lessons on how to make their marriage... work") but it has sent a message to individuals even in my generation the classic TV shows of the 1950s. That message being a miss portrayal of 1950s. The trend of emulating what the media portrays as the ideal lifestyle did not end with the 50s. We can see today how the young people of my generation implement into their lives what they view on the , and thus effecting there families in usually not positive ways. History truly does repeat itself.

I lived in the Detroit area for two years as a missionary for the LDS Church. I spent those two years interacting and teaching the African Americans living in the impoverished inner city of Detroit. Because of this experience, I was able to connect with Aulette's examination of African American working-class families. The inner city of Detroit is exactly what Carol Stack, an anthropologist whom Aulette referenced in her essay, would describe as the "Flats".

I taught many families that were struggling to survive in these poor economic times which are especially bad in Detroit. Just as Aulette writes in her essay, these families had to "swap" resources with their "networks". A perfect example of "swapping" is the automobile. Hardly anyone owns working car in Detroit. They rely on the public transportation, however, its often inconvenient and doesn't cover everywhere in the city. This makes it very difficult for people who missionaries are teaching to go to church. We had rely on others who had cars to transport those without to church. You could say that I was apart of the "swapping" that Aulette discusses.

Cars are just one of many examples of "swapping" that I saw in Detroit. Many of these families lived with there extended families and friends (their "networks"). They pooled their resources to buy food and clothing for themselves and their children, nieces, nephews, and even grandchildren. One of the phrases I heard the most was, "I live with my auntie", or "I was raised by my auntie". Aulette addresses this form of child care or "another mother" in her essay. I would not say that Detroit is a "matriarchal society", however, many of these homes are run by women. This is more out of necessity then the way of their culture.