Family

What is a Family?

‘What is a family?’ is the central question posed by Zach Wahls’ testimony provided here:

Wahls was speaking to the Iowa House Judiciary Committee in response to a proposal to define marriage as being that between a man and a woman. Wahls himself was raised by a lesbian couple and argues that they are, “voting for the first time in the history of our state to codify discrimination into our constitution”. After watching the clip (and possibly the interview which follows) students could work in pairs to come up with their own definition of ‘family’. Wider discussions could then address issues and developments such as the changes to marriage law nationally in the US (June 2015), the nature of family life they have experienced and the extent to which friends could be regarded as the new family (useful Guardian article here:

Discover More Friends are the new family



More Resources from Discovering Sociology


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Generation Boomerang

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