Beyond Joint and Nuclear: The Indian Family Revisited

Abstract

Careful perusal of the family literature in India dispels the belief that the Indian family was basically joint, and that following industrialisation and urbanisation, the nuclear family replaced it. On the contrary, the literature demonstrates that family plurality has been an essential feature of Indian society and that joint, nuclear, single parent, dual earner and adoptive families have always coexisted. The evolution of family research, characterised by distinct phases, each with specific questions, resulted in biases in the research process that hindered the early cognisance of this reality. This paper discusses the multiplicity of family forms simultaneously present in the country. The authors have adopted the chronological phases of family research in India as the mode of presentation in order that an appreciation of the development of family studies in the country, the biases of family researchers and the process of according recognition to family plurality in India emerges.