|
|
Balanced household formation pattern in the behaviour of Belarusian peasants
| In the paper the patterns of the peasant’s household formation are discussed. Traditionally researchers consider two general types of household structure, oriented correspondingly onto nuclear or multiple family as the basic unit. The author demonstrates that among the Belarusian peasants in 16th century the “nuclear-family” pattern predominated, and in the first half of 19th century it was completely changed by the “multiply-family” pattern. But during 18th century the both patterns stably coexisted in approximately equal proportions. As a result the aggregated statistics show the intermediate figures of such parameters as the mean household size, percent of multiple households etc. Analysis of comparative data from the East-European region shows that the intermediate statistics were widely distributed in that period. The author supposes that the stable balance of two behavioral patterns was the effective response to specific socio-economical conditions of the period. So it may be regarded as the separate “balanced” pattern of household formation.
|
|
