The family is often imagined as a place of love, care, belonging, and security. It is where we first learn language, relationships, values, and ways of understanding the world. Yet, despite the enormous influence it has in shaping our attitudes, identities, and assumptions, it remains one of the least questioned institutions in our social lives.
Drawing on the ideas of John Dewey, I would suggest that the institution of the family emerged from the human need for care and cooperation. Human children require years of support before they can fully participate in social life, and the family historically became the space where this care could be provided. In that sense, the family is both natural and necessary. Yet its role and structure have changed over time and continue to evolve across cultures and societies.
At the same time, because the family is associated with affection and emotional intimacy, we often fail to recognize the inequalities and forms of violence embedded within everyday family practices. Many assumptions about gender appear so normal and familiar that they go unquestioned. The first step toward transformation, therefore, is learning to identify the biases and stereotypes that shape our own worldview.
This process is not easy because families do not only provide care — they also shape dispositions, expectations, and habits of thought. From childhood onward, we absorb ideas about who should speak, who should decide, who should sacrifice, and what roles men and women are expected to perform. These lessons are rarely taught explicitly. Instead, they are embedded in ordinary routines, rituals, and interactions.
Gender inequality is not confined to “traditional” or rural settings. Even institutions associated with modernity and progress continue to reflect deep structural inequalities. The documentary Picture a Scientist points to the low representation of women in the sciences. The persistence of such inequalities raises uncomfortable questions about whether education alone can transform deeply rooted social attitudes.
In the Indian context, the discussion becomes even more urgent. Realities such as female foeticide, dowry-related violence, and child abuse continue to occur within families themselves. Many cases of violence remain hidden precisely because the family is assumed to be a safe and sacred space. Laws, while important, have clear limitations when violence occurs within intimate relationships and often goes unreported.
This also draws attention to culture as a powerful force that perpetuates inequality. Rituals, songs, films, blessings, and even casual language can reinforce assumptions about gender and power. A simple example is the traditional blessing “Putravati bhava” — may you be blessed with sons. Though often spoken affectionately and without malice, such expressions reveal how deeply ideas about the preference for sons are woven into everyday life.
These subtle cultural practices matter because they shape consciousness over generations. Discrimination is not sustained only through dramatic acts of violence or explicit exclusion. It is also reproduced quietly, through everyday habits and seemingly harmless expressions that communicate whose lives and aspirations are more valued.
At the same time, we should be cautious about assuming that gender equality has already been achieved simply because women now have greater access to education and employment. Sending girls to school or encouraging them to work outside the home, while important, does not automatically transform power relations within the family. The more difficult question is whether women are truly able to participate equally in decision-making: whom they marry, whether they marry, how property is distributed, or how family resources are used.
True equality, then, cannot be measured only by public visibility. It must also be reflected in relationships, autonomy, and shared authority within the home.
Yet there is reason for hope. While history and culture shape human behaviour deeply, they do not determine it completely. Human beings possess agency — the capacity to reflect, question, and change. Social transformation rarely occurs overnight. Rather, it grows through countless small acts of awareness and courage practiced by ordinary people in daily life.
A more equal society may begin not in parliaments or courtrooms alone, but also in ordinary family conversations: in the language we use, the rituals we continue or abandon, the decisions we share, and the values we choose to pass on to the next generation.
Questioning the everyday, therefore, is not about rejecting family life. It is about recognizing that families are powerful cultural spaces — spaces capable not only of reproducing inequality, but also of nurturing dignity, mutual respect, and equality.
