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Session
3: What is a Community?: Definitions, Concepts, and Assumptions
about Families and Communities as Complex Systems
Monday, September 9
Lecturers
See the biographies for this session's
lecturers:
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Major
Themes to Be Covered
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How
families and communities are changing, the major forces
exerting changes on families and communities; and how
that impacts our definitions of family and community.
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The
ecology of human and family development -- Why individuals,
families, communities, and the natural and designed physical
ecologybuilt environment need to be understood as part
of a dynamic and integrated system.
- The
dynamic and reciprocal relations that exist between families
and communities -- The ways in which individuals influence
families and families influence individuals; the ways in
which families influence communities and communities influence
families.
- Systems
and change: The potential for change across the life span
-- A vision for public policy and social programs that promote
positive ndividual, family, and community growth and change.
Students
Will Learn
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The
conceptual and operational (working) definitions of family,
community and systems.
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The
components and functions of the family and community ecological
systems that influencecomprises human development across
the life course(the micro-, meso-, exo, and macro-systems
within this ecology).
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Examples
of howfrom across the life span of mutual influences between
developing individuals, the structure and function of
the changing American family, and changing neighborhood
and community characteristics influence industrial and
family development.
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The
role that social gradients in opportunity have on families
and their developing children, and the impact that reducing
such disparities can have on the individual, family and
community well being.
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General
principles of intervention that have the greatest likelihood
of improving family centered community buildingare associated
with an approach to family and community systems that
respond to their complex and changing nature.
- A
framework within which to organize and evaluate policies
and programs in regard to their emphasis on dynamic systems
and the attempt to capitalize proactively and positively
on the potential plasticity ofto improve the lives of children,
families, and communities.
Undergraduate
Required Readings
Mintz
S. 1988. Introduction and Chapter 3: The Rise of the Democratic
Family. In: Domestic Revolutions. A Social History of American
Family Life. New York: The Free Press.
Walter CL. 1997. Community building practice: A conceptual
framework (pp. 68-83). In: M Minkler (Ed.), Community Organizing
and Community Building for Health. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers
University Press.Bowen Center for the Study of Family.
Graduate
Required Readings
Small
S, Supple A. 2001. Communities as systems: Is a community
more than the sum of its parts? (pp. 161-174). In: A Booth,
AC Crouter (Eds.), Does It Take A Village? Community Effects
on Children, Adolescents, and Families. Mahwah, New Jersey:
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Suggested
Readings
Aber
JL, Gephart MA, Brooks-Gunn J, Connell JP. 1997. Development
in context: Implications for studying neighborhood effects
(pp. 44-61). In: J Brooks-Gunn, GJ Duncan, JL Aber (Eds.),
Neighborhood Poverty. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
Bowen’s
Theory. www.georgetownfamilycenter.org/pages/theory.html
Keating
DP, Hertzman C. 1999. Modernity’s paradox (pp. 1-19). In:
DP Keating, C Hertzman (Eds.), Developmental Health and
the Wealth of Nations. New York: The Guilford Press.
McKnight
JL, Kretzmann JP. 1997. Mapping community capacity (pp.
157-172). In: M Minkler (Ed.), Community Organizing &
Community Building for Health. New Jersey: Rutgers University
Press.
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