Intimacy Personal Relationships in Modern Societies [Hardcover]

Are personal relationships deeper and more intimate than ever before or are they increasingly empty and structured by selfish individualism? This exciting new book examines the question in a wide-ranging discussion of the nature of intimacy, focusing on key relationships between parents and children, families, sexual partners, couples and friends.Acknowledgements.

1. Introduction.

A Story of Intimacy?.

The Wider Significance of Intimacy in Personal Life.

Dimensions of Intimacy.

Stories and Story Tellers.

Conclusion.

2. From 'The Family' to Sex and Industry. .

The Making of the Conventional Modern Family.

Visions of the Future.

3. Parenting and Intimacy.

Mothers and Fathers as Intimates.

More Shared Caring Between Mothers and Fathers?.

Parenting: Trends in Intimacy and Democracy?.

4. Are Good Friends All You Need? .

Friends, Kin and Intimacy.

Gender, Heterosexuality, Friendship and Intimacy.

5. Sex and Intimacy. .

Introduction.

Stories of 'Normal Sex' and Intimacy.

The Realities of Sexual Lives.

Stories, Practices and Social Change.

6. The Couple: Intimate and Equal? .

The Heterosexual Couple: Still She the Housewife, He the Earner?.

Domestic Violence and Forced Intimacy.

Same-Sex Couples.

Intimacy and Relationship Breakdown.

7. Conclusion. .

Notes.

Bibliography.

IndexlÃ3