Essay – Joint family system
Joint family system Essay: One of the universal and static institutions of mankind in his family. A family is of two types: a nuclear family and a joint family. An extension of the nuclear family is a joint family whereby the unilineal descent group stay together with the offsprings and the spouses. A joint family can be of various types, for example, a man, and his wife with their unmarried sons and daughters, several brothers with their children and wife and a man, his wife, their parents and their unmarried children. Based on the authority holding, the families are distinguished as equalitarian families, husband-dominated and wife-dominated families.
Discussion
Historically, the traditional and below family in India is the joint family system. A joint family comprises three to four living generations including the parents, grandparents, nephews, niece, uncles and aunts. The joint family in India is mainly of patrilineal descent and the children are recognised by their father’s identity. Property is passed from one generation to another within the father’s lineage. Joint families are marked by several characteristics such as sharing a common residence, common religion, and common sentiments and are obviously larger in size as compared to the nuclear family.
There are various advantages of staying in a joint family as there exists manageable financial burdens, the opportunity for leisure, division of labour, social virtues and avoidance of the fragmentation of holding. The financial responsibility is distributed among the members of the family and the economic burden does not solely fall on one person. Thus the economic stability in the family is maintained. In addition, every member of the family is equally assigned tasks therefore the burden of tasks does not fall entirely on one person.
The family members get time to enjoy their leisure time as the work is distributed among all the family members. Children living in a joint family are taught moral virtues such as tolerance, patience, respect, compassion and discipline. Moreover, they also learn to work in discipline and in a team and all these are tight by the elder members of the family. One of the major disadvantages of a nuclear family is that the sense of bonding or belongingness exists in a limited sense. Contrary to this, the binding between the members of a joint family is undoubtedly inevitable.
However, there are certain advantages of a joint family system. This is because the non-earning members do not develop any urge to earn for themselves as their economic demands are met by the other members of the family. Many joint families are orthodox as a result of which it acts as a hindrance in the development of personality and thus individual autonomy cannot be exercised. Furthermore, privacy is denied and also there are fewer savings by the earning family members.
Conclusion
To conclude it can be said that, the joint family is undoubtedly and undeniably the best as compared o the nuclear family system. People living in a joint family never suffer from economic insecurity, household work is shared by all the family members and thus they get to enjoy their leisure time. In addition, children growing up in a joint family learn social and moral values. However, joint families have some disadvantages such as few scopes of personal growth for the orthodox nature.
FAQs
Q1. Define joint family.
Ans: An extension of the nuclear family is a joint family whereby parents, their offspring, grandparents, uncle, aunt, nephew, and niece stay together.
Q2. State any one disadvantage of a joint family.
Ans: People staying in a joint family get the lesser scope to save a family as they have to contribute a major part of their income for the well-being of the family.
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