Second Draft of Final Exam questions, updated Dec 6, 2012.

 

 

Sample questions for the in-class final exam. The final will consist of essay questions including some of the following. The final is a closed- book exam, no notes are allowed.

 

Essays should explain causes and effects, rather than simply providing a laundry list. A careful explanation with a few detailed and carefully considered examples is always better than a long list of examples without sufficient explanation.

 

* Describe the feminist critique of the traditional family (think Friedan, Ettelbrick, Faludi, and Hochschild), and of traditional family scholarship. How do proponents of the traditional heterosexual married nuclear family respond to the critique? [Used this on the midterm, so it probably won’t be on the final]

 

* How good an analogy is Loving v. Virginia, and the legalization of and rise of interracial marriage in the US, for the legal and public policy status of same-sex marriage in the US today?

 

* What is the logic of the slippery slope argument, how does it relate to same-sex marriage, who makes the slippery slope argument, and what kinds of responses do others have against the slippery slope?

 

* How is childhood character shaped by parents, how do we know what parents' effect on children is, and how and why has childhood changed over time in the US?

 

* How have US popular attitudes towards gay rights changed over time? What evidence do we have that attitudes have actually changed? What explains the change over time in attitudes?

 

* Why does marriage matter to society, and how has marriage changed over American history?

 

* What are the racial differences in out of wedlock births, and what are the explanations for the differences? How has the rate of out-of-wedlock births changed since the Moynihan report? How has the Moynihan report been received by other scholars? [This question was on the midterm, so it won’t be on the final]

 

* In what way do different views about the history of the family inform our different views about the meaning of family or family change today?

 

* What is the Second Shift, why does it continue to exist, why is it important, and why is it difficult to study?

 

* Explain the decisions, the public policy relevance, and the broader significance of the four California cases on gay marriage: Lockyer v San Francisco (2004), In Re Marriage Cases (2008), Strauss v. Horton (2009), and Perry v. Schwarzenegger (2010).

 

Identifications:

 

Family Government

 

The Independent Life Stage

 

Demographic Metabolism

 

The Defense of Marriage Act (US, 1996)

 

Griswold v. Connecticut (US Supreme Court 1965)

 

Loving v. Virginia (US Supreme Court 1967)

 

Bowers v. Hardwick (US Supreme Court 1986)

 

Lawrence v. Texas (US Supreme Court 2003)

 

Baehr v. Miike (Hawaii Circuit Court 1996)

 

Goodridge v. Dept Public Health (Massachusetts Supreme Court 2004)

 

Perez v. Sharp (California Supreme Court 1948)

 

In Re Marriage Cases (California Supreme Court 2008)

 

Roe v. Wade (US Supreme Court 1973)

 

In Re Gardiner (Kansas Supreme Court 2002)

 

Turner v. Safley (US Supreme Ct 1987)

 

Strauss v. Horton (California Supreme Court 2009)

 

Perry v. Schwarzenegger (US district court 2010)

 

Alfred Kinsey

 

Sigmund Freud

 

Stonewall

 

Seneca Falls, 1848

 

Functionalism

 

Incomplete Institutionalization of Step Parenthood

 

Original Intent

 

Matrifocal Family

 

Coverture