Patterns of Marriage, Childbearing, and Childrearing

should consist of TWO essays, submitted as one document. first essay (discussing two books) comprising at least  1/2 of the total Question #1:  Describe and explain variations in patterns of marriage, childbearing and childrearing examined in Promises I Can Keep and Unequal Childhoods. Consider the different implications – advantages as well as disadvantages- of these patterns for males and females, children and adults. Approach this question as a paper.  Note: Make sure you offer a CLEAR statement of the principal arguments of each author – whether you agree with it or not. Include a short statement of WHERE  each study was carried out, and the methods used for the investigation (this can be done in no more than 3-4 sentences.) Explore the ideas to be drawn from these books and don’t hesitate to describe your individual response to them. Convince me that you have given these texts a close careful reading and have not depended solely on lectures by offering a few precise quotations or references to parts of the texts that illustrate a point you are making. An essay is not a list, but should read as a well-considered presentation and reflection on the texts.  Pay particular attention to crafting your introductory and concluding paragraphs.  While your own responses to these texts are important, do NOT go off on a tangent that leaves the texts behind!  Be sure in communicating your own ideas and experience that you anchor them to references to the texts. The understanding to be gleaned from these books can be amplified, if you wish, with reference to your own experience.  But the texts, NOT opinions you held even before reading them, must remain the focus of your essay.  Question #2: Answer A) or B) –NOT both. A) Drawing both upon lectures and upon Gillis’ A World of Their Own Making, briefly summarize the most significant changes in household composition, marriage, work, reproduction, childrearing, old age and mortality that have radically altered family life in Western culture since the 19th century Industrial Revolution. How does the history of your own  family across three generations compare with these trends?  B) What is the principal argument of Gillis’ A World of Their Own Making? Choose one theme from Gillis’ a cultural history of the symbolic representations, ceremonies and rituals expressive of changing ideals of family life.  Discuss the theme as presented by Gillis, and compare with your own observations and experience (with respect to the theme you have identified) of the families people “live by,” and the “making” of them. In examining your own experience, note and attempt to explain any changes over time in the symbolic representation of family, to which Gillis has drawn your attention, that you have chosen to discus