INTRODUCTION

• The interaction of the individual and society determines each person’s status and role(s), which are not merely a matter of personal choice.

• Social institutions constrain, control, punish, and reward individuals.

• Institutions can be ‘macro’ (e.g., the state) or ‘micro’ (e.g., the family).

• Sociology/social anthropology studies institutions in key areas such as family, marriage, kinship, politics, economics, religion, and education.

• An institution functions according to rules established or acknowledged by law or custom.

• Institutions operate regularly and continuously, and understanding them requires considering these rules.

• Institutions impose constraints but also provide opportunities to individuals.

• Institutions can be seen as ends in themselves, such as family, religion, state, or education.

• There are different understandings of social institutions, influenced by sociological perspectives.

• The functionalist view sees institutions as social norms, beliefs, values, and role relationships that arise to meet societal needs.

• Societies have informal institutions (e.g., family, religion) and formal institutions (e.g., law, formal education).

• The conflict view argues that individuals are unequally placed in society.

• All social institutions operate in the interest of the dominant sections (e.g., class, caste, tribe, gender).

• The dominant social section controls political and economic institutions and ensures that ruling class ideas become the ruling ideas of society.

• This contrasts with the functionalist idea of general societal needs.

• Social institutions can constrain and offer opportunities, but their impact may be unequal across social groups.

• Examples include how the family affects men and women differently, or how political/legal institutions influence the privileged and the dispossessed differently.

FAMILY, MARRIAGE AND KINSHIP

• The family appears to be the most ‘natural’ social entity, leading people to assume all families are like their own.

• It is viewed as universal and unchanging, but research in sociology and social anthropology shows that while family, marriage, and kinship exist in all societies, their character varies across cultures.

• The family (private sphere) is interconnected with the economic, political, cultural, and educational (public) spheres.

• There is a need to share and borrow from different disciplines when studying the family.

• Functionalists argue that the family performs important tasks that meet society’s basic needs and help perpetuate social order.

• The functionalist perspective claims modern industrial societies work best when women look after the family and men earn the livelihood.

• Indian studies (Singh 1993: 83) show that families need not become nuclear in an industrial economy, indicating that trends from one society cannot be generalised.

• Functionalists see the nuclear family as best suited for industrial society, with one adult working outside and the other caring for the home and children.

• This specialisation of roles assigns the husband the ‘instrumental’ role (breadwinner) and the wife the ‘affective’ role (emotional, domestic).

• This vision is gender unjust and empirically untrue, as studies across cultures and history show different patterns.

• In industries like garment export, women form a large part of the labour force, challenging the separation of roles.

• The assumption that men are necessarily the heads of households is not always true.