Understanding The Appalachian People 's Kinship And Family Life

Family. What do you picture? Two married parents, their son and daughter, and maybe a dog, all living in a two story house in a nice suburban neighborhood. And who should blame you for picturing that? It’s been drilled into our minds all throughout our childhoods. Through our families, the tv, the books we read. But is this really all true? 50 percent of all marriages end in divorce and of that 50 percent, 46 percent are families. So why is this “perfect” family ideal so widespread? Author Barbara Kingsolver tries to explain this in her essay: ‘Stone Soup’. She claims it’s because society is so traditional and primitive in the way we idealize what a family is supposed to be: two married parents and their children. But that’s not really the case anymore. The main idea of her essay is that the definition of family needs to be reimagined to define more of what a family means, rather than what its terminology implies.

What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of the state of Arkansas? Chances are, that as an Arkansan the thoughts are quite different than those of someone not born or raised here. Hillbilly, redneck, barefoot, and trailer are a just few of the common first words invoked in the minds of “foreigners” by the word Arkansas. In the non-fiction work, Arkansas/Arkansaw: How Bear Hunters, Hillbillies, and Good Ol' Boys Defined a State, author Brooks Blevins provides readers with his idea of how Arkansas's image began, and then perpetuated over time. He provides several examples of the

In the world of Appalachia, stereotypes are abundant. There are stories told of mountaineers as lazy, bewildered, backward, and yet happy and complacent people. Mountain women are seen as diligent, strong, hard willed, and overall sturdy and weathered, bearing the burden of their male counterparts. These ideas of mountain life did not come out of thin air; they are the direct product of sensational nineteenth century media including print journalism and illustrative art that has continuously mislead and wrongfully represented the people of Appalachia. These stories, written and told by outsiders, served very little purpose to Appalachian natives other than means of humiliation and degradation. They served mostly to convince readers of the

Appalachia is a 205,000-square-mile region that follows the spine of the Appalachian Mountains stretching from southern New York to northern Mississippi. It is home to more than 25 million people.

In Uneven Ground, the author Ronald D. Eller narrates the economic, political, and social change of Appalachia after World War II. He writes “persistent unemployment and poverty set Appalachia off as a social and economic problem area long before social critic Michael Harrington drew attention to the region as part of the “other America” in 1962.”(pp.2) Some of the structural problems stated by Eller include problems of land abuse, political corruption, economic shortsightedness, and the loss of community and culture; personally view the economic myopia as being the most daunting.

In today’s society, family is often attempted to be organized within a social structure. Within this structure family typically is consisted of mom, dad, daughter, and son. However, many families do not fit into this configuration. These families may include same sex couples, separated or divorced families, extended families, or even blended families. Even though these families may be happy and healthy, to many they are not considered real families. Going along with the topic of imperfect families, both Barbara Kingsolver and Richard Rodriguez try to break down the traditional family structure through their writing. While Kingsolver’s “Stone Soup” and Rodriguez’s “Family Values” explore the ideas of different family structures and traditional American values, “Stone Soup” breaks down what an actual family is like while “Family Values” expresses the value of family in different cultures.

     Many people have different views on what Appalachia is, I grew up thinking that Appalachia meant people were dirty, poor, illiterate, inbreed and we also called them mountain people. As I grew up I realized that most of the things they went through and had a hard time with, I was dealing with the same problems. So what exactly is Appalachia? Well you will find out as you read on.

Activism, culture and value have always had a tremendous influence in society. When it comes to the Appalachian region of the United States, people tend to see our culture and values differently. The individuals of the Appalachian region have been stereotyped for far too long, people forget that West Virginia has played a huge role in building this country. Our coal miners have put their lives in danger time and time again, some losing them, for worker’s rights. The Battle of Blair Mountain was the largest labor rebellion in the history of the United States. This was the foundation of the movement for eight hour work days and minimum wages. The novel Storming Heaven by Denise Giardina is a fictionalized tale of the conflict that took place in these coal fields of West Virginia. The novel brings to light the stereotypes, race and religion of the Appalachian people.

As a society, we expect everybody to follow our norms, rules and regulations. However, Appalachia seems to have its own set of norms. Although they may not consider them to be deviant, the normals and those in power probably would. One of the biggest problems in Appalachia is the leading agents of their society. During the documentary, we follow four different people, and we see their leading agents, which are their parents and families. Shawn’s mother sells pills, Jeremy follows his father-in-law down into the mines to provide for his fledgling family, Courtney’s mom is a high school dropout and Erica’s mom has been in and out of rehab constantly. How can these children break the cycle of poverty and deviance if they are learning and living

Stephanie Coontz in “The Way We Weren’t: The Myth and Reality of the Traditional Family” emphasizes that the traditional and ideal nuclear family widespread in media and textbooks are false and far from reality. In fact, it is common to see more similarities to the traditional family consistent of “male breadwinner and nurturing mother” (1) today than in the past.

Times have changed; the nuclear family is no longer the American ideal because family needs have changed since the 1950's. This American convention of a mother and father and their two children, were a template of films and early television as a depiction of the American family life. Now seen as archaic and cliché by today’s standards, but the idea is common throughout many of the first world nations in the world. This ideal was a vast departure from the past agrarian and pre industrial families, and was modeled and structured as the ‘American dream’ father working, mother maintaining the household and children molded to be simulacra of the parents. This portrayal was not the standard; many communities throughout America had a different

This essay will explore the cultural values of three different cultures; Navajo, Laguna, and Euro-American culture. Two of the cultures that I will be exploring are the Native communities that I have been well exposed to since I was a child. The values that I will be discussing are gender, education, and money. Growing up on a reservation in New Mexico, I have a closer insight on the similarities and differences of those values.

Growing up I spent most of my summers with my father’s side of the family. What makes my father’s side of the family so beautifully unique is that they are Amish. Transitioning from the months spent with my immediate family living in urban society to summers with my Amish family on the farm was always quite an adjustment. However, having been so young I was easily guided by the elders as to what the social norms were of the Amish and quickly learned what was expected of me while I was living with them. It wasn’t until I got older and what my family refers to as more “worldly” that I began to struggle abiding by their rules and customs. The first time I remember truly being confused and shocked by my family’s culture is the summer I visited

n the upcoming page’s I will answer the following questions. Why is family the most important agent of socialization? What caused the dramatic changes to the American family? What are the changes? I will discuss the differences in marriage and family, I will discuss how they are linked to class, race, gender, and personal choices. The purpose of this study is to explore the many different family functions and the paths that people are now choosing. I will give my opinion on whether these changes have had a positive or negative affect. I will finally discuss the trend of the modern family, back to pre-World War II family structure, how would that effect the strides that have been made in the progression of women rights.

The families in America are steadily changing. While they remain our most valued and consistent source of strength and comfort, some families are becoming increasingly unstructured. In the past, the typical family consists of a working father, a stay at home mother and, of course, well-rounded children. Today, less than 20 percent of American families fit nicely into this cookie cutter image. American households have never been more diverse. Natalie Angier takes stock of the changing definition of family in an article for the New York Times.