A Comparison of Changing Family Structures

Contents

INTRODUCTION 3

LITERATURE REVIEW 4

METHODOLOGY 6

DISCUSSION 10

THE CHANGE 10

THE URDU SPEAKING COMMUNITY 10

THE DELHI WALA COMMUNITY 11

REASONS FOR CHANGING FAMILY STRUCTURES 12

THE URDU SPEAKING COMMUNITY 12

THE DELHI WALA COMMUNITY 17

THE COMPARISON OF CHANGING FAMILY STRUCTURES IN THE TWO COMMUNITIES AND THE REASONS FOR DIFFERENCE IN THE NATURE OF CHANGE 20

IN THE WIDER CONTEXT OF A POLITICAL ECONOMY 23

THE IDEAL TYPE 24

THE DEHLI WALA COMMUNITY 24

THE URDU SPEAKING COMMUNITY 24

CONCLUSION 26

APPENDIX 28

QUESTIONS FOR INTERVIEW 28

REFERENCES 29

INTRODUCTION

I have always been interested in noting, that why all my friends belonging to Delhi wala families live in a joint family system? And why we as an Urdu speaking family could not live in joint family system? Why I was deprived of the love and affection of my grandparents as a child? Why did I have to spend my childhood alone at home, taking care of my little sister, while my mother was at work?

All my friends from Delhi wala families were brought up under the love and affection of their grandparents, uncles and aunts. Their mothers stayed at home, and their childhood was not as lonely as mine. However, later I observed that their family structures began to change too, from larger to smaller families. But a difference has always existed between our families’ structures and those of my friends from Delhi wala families.

All these changes led to the rise of many questions in my mind. Have the family structures in the Delhi wala community and the Urdu speaking community changed? What are the reasons behind this change? Is the change in family structures different between these two communities? If the change is different, then what are the reasons behind this difference in change? These few questions have forced me to study these communities in depth, and find out the answers of all these questions. I wanted to find out, the reason for my lonely childhood. My personal experience and my observation in the society has led me to this research, a research to compare changing family structures between the Urdu speaking (muhajir) community and the Delhi wala community.