Summary Of The American Family By Stephanie Coontz

There’s an old saying that goes, â€Å"Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That’s why it’s called the present†, by Alice Morse Earle. The world has become a place taken for granted. Humans are beginning to wish they could live in the past, while others just want to skip over to the future but what ever happened to living right now? Or living in the moment? In the story, â€Å"The American Family†, by Stephanie Coontz, she discusses why so many individuals believe American families are facing worse issues now than in the past. She discusses how in the previous years, it was far worse and explains why those people are wrong to assume they are facing worse problems now. In addition, Robert Kuttner and his text, â€Å"The politics of family†, supports Coontz’ argument about the dilemmas facing the turn-of-the-century American families and gives the resolutions to those problems; such as talking out problems, wom en having the right to walk out of unsatisfactory marriages, and lastly, the emancipation for women. In the past, plenty of issues were concealed instead of confronting them, which is no longer the case nowadays. Coontz has noted, â€Å"There are plenty of stresses in modern family life, but one reason they seem worse is that we no longer sweep them under the rug† (96). We talk candidly about controversies now, no longer hiding issues. We straighten out the problem instead of hiding or ignoring it. There are two disputing narratives about American families. One