Household Economic Strategies: Review and Research Agenda

Abstract

Within a number of disciplines such as anthropology, demography, economics, history, and sociology, renewed interest recently has been manifested in research on family and domestic groups. In contrast to traditional studies that sought universal patterns of family structure and function, contemporary research tends to devote greater attention to the diversity of historically specific patterns (Yanagisako 1979). Many scholars are currently focusing on the relationship between changing forms of production and the domestic group formations through which the immediate material needs of most individuals are met.