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229 Annals Am. Acad. Pol. & Soc. Sci. vii (1943)

handle is hein.cow/anamacp0229 and id is 1 raw text is: FOREWORD

A SURVEY of the literature on the
family in this country for the past one
hundred and fifty years reveals some
very definite trends in both type and
amount of interest in that subject.
Without reference to the field of fiction,
the last century witnessed very few
realistic or thorough appraisals of fam-
ily life, certainly nothing approaching
what has been done today. For the
most part the material consists of a host
of common sense and often dogmatic
statements; plenty of sweet chapters
in the etiquette books; and thousands
of pious platitudes delivered from the
pulpits.
John Howard Payne, the American-
born actor, wrote the opera, Clari, or the
Maid of Milan, in which there appeared
the famous song, Home, Sweet Home.
This was produced in the Covent Gar-
den Theatre, London, in 1823. Its nos-
talgic and sentimental qualities seem to
have set the key for much of the writ-
ing of the century. It must have ex-
pressed and probably continues to ex-
press much popular feeling. In his
book, Manners, Culture and Dress of
the Best American Society (1890),
Richard A. Wells introduces the chapter
on The Home with: If the home is
graced and sweetened with kindness and
smiles, no matter how humble the abode,
the heart will turn lovingly toward it
from all the tumult of the world, and
it will be the dearest spot beneath the
circuit of the sun (p. 245).
Quite typical of the theological con-
tributions was The Wedding Ring, a
Series of Sermons on the Duties of Hus-
band and Wife, by the noted clergyman,
Thomas DeWitt Talmage. These con-
tained the usual homilies on the im-
mortal theme of marriage.
The nineteenth century may be char-
acterized as having been deluged with

warnings, lamentations, exhortations,
and eulogies on the American Home.
While, no doubt, many of the current
observations about the contemporary
family merely duplicate the past and
are largely on an emotional level, the
serious students have become, for the
most part, far more analytical and ob-
jective than was possible in the 1800's.
One important reason is that in the
present century there have gradually
been developed new and skillful tech-
niques for the scientific study of so-
ciety, and a type of objectivity so nec-
essary for a competent investigation of
the various aspects of human behavior.
Definitive studies of every aspect of
the family life have increased enor-
mously since World War I. And now
in the midst of the Second World War,
this background of information and the
scientific method make possible the pres-
entation of the material in this volume.
It represents the collective effort of
authorities in the various fields which
are concerned with or touch in one way
or another on that unity of interacting
personalities known as the family.
It is perhaps significant that this vol-
ume deals with a topic which has es-
caped most of the students and writers
of the past. War and the family
never appears for serious consideration
in any of the periodical literature in
this country prior to 1914. Popular in-
terest was centered around everything
else connected with war-military strat-
egy, politics, and profits-but not the
effects on the family. In the last war a
number of articles appeared, but as far
as the editor can discover no books were
written on the subject. THE ANNALS
during 1917-18 did not publish a num-
ber on War and the Family.
Today the story is far different, as
even a casual survey of the material will

vii

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