The definition of family is different for every individual. For some people, family is strictly between blood relatives; meanwhile, other people define family by the bonds they create among people they meet in life. To further explore the concept of family values, I had the pleasure of interviewing one of my colleagues, Miss Stephanie Paleo, about what she considers “family”. Stephanie is of Haitian descent and was born in New Jersey in 1996. Both of her parents immigrated from Haiti with their families to the Northeast part of the United States, and her parents met in New York. They currently live in Douglasville, GA while Stephanie continues her studies in college. With her consent, we collected ethnographic data about her kinship and further
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However, some will only consider the direct family unit as immediate family (and other people being secondary family members), while some might consider anyone living in the main household to be an immediate family member. To Stephanie, her immediate family includes individuals that live in her household, which is her mother, Marie-Sandra, her father, Hamilton, her younger sister, Miriam, and her mother’s sister, Clunny. She considers her immediate family to be of blood relation. She tends to include her Aunt Clunny as part of her immediate family because she’s known her since she was little; she treats Aunt Clunny to be more of a sibling than an aunt. In addition, because Aunt Clunny is being supported by Stephanie’s mom and dad, she categorizes her family as nuclear. A nuclear family is a family that has a mom, a dad, and children; the two adults in the family cooperate economically to nurture the children in the family (Gonzalez). When Stephanie was growing up, she had an aunt (Clunny) and an uncle (Lulince) on her mother’s side who were 10 years older than her. She considered them as siblings and refers to them by first name. Because of this, she believes she came from a more nuclear family than extended
However, some will only consider the direct family unit as immediate family (and other people being secondary family members), while some might consider anyone living in the main household to be an immediate family member. To Stephanie, her immediate family includes individuals that live in her household, which is her mother, Marie-Sandra, her father, Hamilton, her younger sister, Miriam, and her mother’s sister, Clunny. She considers her immediate family to be of blood relation. She tends to include her Aunt Clunny as part of her immediate family because she’s known her since she was little; she treats Aunt Clunny to be more of a sibling than an aunt. In addition, because Aunt Clunny is being supported by Stephanie’s mom and dad, she categorizes her family as nuclear. A nuclear family is a family that has a mom, a dad, and children; the two adults in the family cooperate economically to nurture the children in the family (Gonzalez). When Stephanie was growing up, she had an aunt (Clunny) and an uncle (Lulince) on her mother’s side who were 10 years older than her. She considered them as siblings and refers to them by first name. Because of this, she believes she came from a more nuclear family than extended