Diversity and Family Culture

This week in Family Studies we've been talking about diversity within families. One of the greatest ways that families are diverse is social class. It was interesting to think a little bit about my family's socioeconomic status (SES) and how that's affected me in my life.
My family's social class changed drastically when my dad was laid off about four years ago. When you're used to living in the means of one social class and then drop to another one, it's a challenge to change your ways to that of the lower social class. It's created an interesting dynamic and has made for a lot of really interesting learning experiences.
Besides that, my family culture has been shaped by my number of family members, five, and the three daughters my parents have. Not having any brothers has definitely influenced how my family culture has been throughout my life.
A big part of my family culture was influenced by moving so often. Before my sisters were married, we lived as a family in Utah, Washington, Minnesota and Chicago. Living in all of those places gave us many different experiences and shaped our family in different ways. My sisters both got married and then my parents and I lived back in Washington, which created a very different dynamic and culture, just being my parents and I.
On the surface, one would think that any middle class, white, five-member family would be considered as having the same culture. On the contrary, there are many factors that go in to shaping every single family's culture.