CHANGED FAMILY LIFE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22595, 7 December 1936, Page 8

CHANGED FAMILY LIFE

"In Victorian days marriage was early and families were big. To-day marriage is a good deal later and families are small," said Dr. H. A. Mess in a recent broadcast on family life. "It is difficult for ns to realise how great the change has been and how big its effects are. In tlio 'seventies there was one child born each year for every tli ree married women under the age of 45. Think what that meant: it meant that the great majority of married women were expecting a baby or nursing a baby. In 19.30 there was one baby born for every eight married women. Child-bearing had ceased to be a continuous process: there were intervals and respites. Obviously this has meant a great release of energies for other purposes. Then in Victorian days the woman was usually much less educated than her husband, and daughters received an education much inferior to that of sons. To-day the women are nearly as well educated as the men, and there is comparatively little left of the old male sense of superiority. Then the Victorian family was an authoritarian family. The husband was lord over wife and family. A wife had very few rights indeed. When Queen Victoria came to the throne a husband could even refuse permission to his wife to see her own children. It was not until 1882 that a married woman could own property; previous to that her husband owned everything that came to her as well as to him. But even to-day family ties mean a good deal. And with all its changes in form the smaller family, the family of parents and children, is very strongly knit. I think the bonds are stronger and more lasting because there is less of authority and more of companionship. In spite of all changes the family remains one of the most stable and powerful of human groupings."