| Abstract: | Official statistics indicate that 22-44% of women in CARICOM countries are sole heads of households. Some have argued that there are so many female-headed households in the Caribbean simply because those societies have failed to realize the nuclear family norms espoused by the American sociologists of the 1950s. On the contrary, family formations are adaptations to economic and social conditions, with the nuclear family being only one of many family forms. Women have long been acknowledged as the backbone of Caribbean families. In the dominant culture of the region, marriage is not considered necessary for procreation, so women may choose to have and raise children independently. The female-headed household widely seen in the Caribbean is becoming more widely seen in the West. The notion that single-parent families are dysfunctional needs to be re-examined and equal recognition and support given to all family forms. |
