American Family Trends

The United States of America is a very multinational and multi-cultural country. This nation formed by immigrants has a little of almost every culture of the world mixed together. That’s why it’s hard to talk about something typical for Americans – what is common for one family can be unusual for another. Of course, there are stereotypes. An American family with two parents and two children living in a single house and having a pet and two cars is one of them. As all stereotypes, that’s not true in most cases.

The traditional American family consisting of a husband, wife and children is becoming less and less frequent. More people who are not legally married are living together. More and more children are being raised in single-parent families, by both poor women and by women who are professionally employed. Others postpone marriage and childbirth and as a consequence bear fewer children than women who marry earlier. Among the educated more and more couples are deciding to have fewer and fewer children. An exception to this trend occurs among blacks, Hispanics and among the very poor. In 1990 the size of the average American family was 3.2 individuals.

Young people rarely live with their parents. Usually, upon graduation from high school children move out of the family home. To reduce expenses young people frequently rent apartments or a house. Usually two to five young people rent an apartment or a house together and share other expenses.

While young people are getting married later in life, the divorce rate is increasing. Roughly 50% of all marriages in the US now end in divorce.

Now let’s have a look at an American family – the Palermos, living in Dallas.

Kent (an accountant) and Connie (works part-time as a pre-school teacher) have two children – Valerie (15) and Lindsey (11). They live in Bedford a suburban town in a house, as most Americans.

The Palermo family is a very busy family, mostly with sports activities. After school (it starts at around 8 am and finishes at about 3 pm) the girls are busy with soccer and basketball practices, their hobbies and everyday homework. They study five days a week from Monday to Friday, and have the same schedule every day. Kent and Connie also like sports and are very active people. Connie was a soccer player in elementary school, also took ballet lessons and was in a girl-scout club. Kent played football, basketball, baseball, ran track, was a boy-scout. Now he enjoys playing golf and likes hiking. As their hobbies, Lindsey and Valerie take piano lessons, and Valerie also plays clarinet in a school band.

In their free time, Palermo family enjoys visiting their friends, going to movies, exhibition centres, different events such as rodeos and fairs, or just having rest near the TV. The girls also like video games, playing table-tennis, bike-riding, playing with their dog and going shopping to the malls – their most favourite thing. They also love visiting their friends.

Another Palermo family’s favourite activity is travelling. They also like being outdoors exploring Texas by hiking and camping near one of hundreds of man-made lakes.

Holidays – Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving – the Palermos usually spend gathering with friends and relatives like one large family.

The last name Palermo has Italian routes. As most Americans, the Palermos have a lot of different nationalities in their family tree. Connie is German, English, Dutch, French, American Indian, Irish… Kent is Italian, Czech and has native American ancestors.

Spending Sunday morning in church is very common for American families. Many churches offer Saturday evening services because of people’s busy schedules. Church for Americans is not only praying, but also a chance to meet with friends.

Answer the following questions.

1. What is a stereotype of an American family?

2. Why is the traditional American family becoming less frequent nowadays?

3. What is young people’s attitude to family life?

4. The divorce rate is increasing, isn’t it? What are the reasons?

5. Does the Palermo family conform to the typical stereotype of the family? Why/why not?