Cover -- FAMILIES IN SOCIETY - Boundaries and relationships -- Contents -- List of tables -- Acknowledgements -- Notes on contributors -- Introduction -- ONE - Families and relationships: boundaries and bridges -- Introduction -- Boundaries and boundary practices -- Interpreting families and relationships -- Firm boundaries: families as we knew and know them -- Challenging boundaries: changing families -- Conclusions -- Part One: Families in society -- TWO - Balancing work and family life: mothers' views -- Introduction -- The study -- Boundaries and balances -- Conclusion -- THREE - Gender, care, poverty and transitions -- Introduction -- Care: the changing policy context -- Gender, care and transitions: a case study -- Conclusion -- FOUR - Families, education and the 'participatory imperative' -- Introduction -- The study -- Total schooling? -- Talking back? -- Conclusion -- Part Two: Children, families and relationships -- FIVE - Children's boundaries: within and beyond families -- Introduction -- Children's boundaries of identity, family and trust -- Parent-child negotiations of boundary setting -- Family systems perspectives on boundaries -- Family therapy and boundaries -- Other professionals and boundary setting -- Conclusions -- SIX - Family within and beyond the household boundary: children's constructions of who they live with -- Introduction -- Researching family structure -- Discussion -- SEVEN - Children managing parental drug and alcohol misuse: challenging parent-child boundaries -- Introduction -- Roles and responsibilities -- Risk and knowledge -- Space and time -- Discussion -- Conclusion -- Part Three: Health, illness and well-being -- EIGHT - Intersections of health and well-being in women's lives and relationships at mid-life -- Introduction -- Changing conceptualisations of women's health and ageing at mid-life -- The study.

Falling to bits but keeping it together: making sense of health and well-being in mid-life -- Concluding comments -- NINE - Families, relationships and the impact of dementia - insights into the 'ties that bind' -- Introduction -- Dementia -- Case studies -- Implications for 'care' in relationships of people with dementia -- Some concluding thoughts -- TEN - Violence and families: boundaries, memories and identities -- Introduction -- Violence in and between families -- Our home, my family: construction and preservation -- Contested boundaries: families, public institutions and violence -- The case studies -- Concluding comments -- Part Four: Relationships and friendships -- ELEVEN - Boundaries of intimacy -- Introduction -- Intensifying intimacy by keeping others distant -- Authentic intimacy and public democracy or illusory intimacy and empty democracy? -- 'Public community' versus 'private intimacy' -- Intimacy, social change and boundary practices? -- TWELVE - Solo living, individual and family boundaries: findings from secondary analysis -- Introduction -- Research evidence -- Incidence of solo living in the UK, Britain and Scotland -- Conclusions -- THIRTEEN - Boundaries of friendship -- Introduction -- Constructing families -- Friendship -- Friends as family -- Conclusion -- FOURTEEN - Living and loving beyond the boundaries of the heteronorm: personal relationships in the 21st century -- Introduction -- Thinking beyond the heteronormative family -- Queer social change and the analysis of contemporary personal life -- Living and loving beyond the heteronorm -- Imagining relationships beyond 'the family': an agenda for future research -- Conclusion -- FIFTEEN - Perspectives on social policies and families -- Introduction -- Boundaries as a conceptual device -- Boundaries and boundary work in a policy context -- Index.