HYM4230

Happy families? The western European family, 17th - 19th centuries

(ART)

Proposed to be offered next in 2002

David Garrioch

8 or 12 points + 2 hours per week + Second semester + Clayton

Synopsis: The period from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century witnessed the widespread acceptance in Western Europe of a new ideal of the family: as a small, close-knit, child-centred and inward-looking domestic group. `Happy Families?0, focussing on England and France, uses diaries, letters, novels, portraits and memoirs to examine the spread of this new ideal of the family, to assess how far family structures and relationships changed in reality, looking particularly at gender roles and parent-child relationships, and to examine the different methods and conceptual tools historians have used to explain changes in ideas, representations, and realities of past family life.

Assessment: 8 points - Research essay (4000 words):70% + Take-home examination (2000 words):30% + 12 points - Essay (2000 words): 25% + Research essay (5000 words): 50% + Take-home examination (2 hours): 25%