Hilde Bras | Wageningen University (original) (raw)
Papers by Hilde Bras
Bijdragen en Mededelingen betreffende de Geschiedenis der Nederlanden, 2011
The twentieth century has witnessed tremendous change in marriage and conjugal relations, ranging... more The twentieth century has witnessed tremendous change in marriage and conjugal relations, ranging from the first sexual revolution of the 1920s, the “golden age of marriage” during the 1950s and 1960s, to the “implosion” of marriage and the growth of divorce, cohabitation, singlehood, and same-sex and blended families in recent decades. The shifts in the ties that bound twentieth-century people into marriage had important repercussions for their bonds with family, friends, neighbors, and community and vice versa. This chapter traces how people’s marital ties evolved from the 1920s to the present and how social networks, pivoting around the conjugal bond, have altered. It does so by focusing on four broad questions. First, why and how did marital relations change and how are these changes understood in their historical context? Second, how did people’s broader personal networks alter during this period? What sorts of ties were important? What roles did friends, family and kin, and neighbors and community members play? Third, how did these changes differ across gender, social class, time, and space? Fourth, what did changing ties mean for people’s well-being, for instance in terms of loneliness, divorce, and the quality and stability of relations? The chapter addresses these questions through a broad synthesis of scholarship for five periods of significant change: the 1920s, the 1930s to 1940s, the 1950s to 1960s, the 1970s, and the 1980s to present. We present examples from the United Kingdom, the United States, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Japan, Korea, and Ukraine. We compare Western and non-Western societies where possible, but the majority of our evidence is on Western societies. We also compare norms, values, and practices across family systems with either “strong” or “weak” ties. In “strong ties” regions and groups, individuals’ bonds to kin, family, neighbors, and community are most important, while in family systems marked by “weak ties,” non-kin connections predominate. We distinguish also between collectivist societies, which emphasize the group and its interests, and individualist societies, which promote the interests of the individual over those of the state or group. Since the 1920s, people in most Western societies have witnessed vast swings in the importance of the marital tie in relation to other social connections. While social configurations during the nineteenth and early twentieth century had been broadly composed, consisting of close ties to parents, siblings, neighbors, and same-sex friends, as of the 1920s the conjugal relation became increasingly more central. During the 1950s and 1960s the prominence of the marriage tie was at its peak. Since the 1970s, the pendulum has swung back again to a situation in which a much wider configuration of social connections is important. Different from the nineteenth century, however, contemporary social networks comprise relations of choice rather than ties of blood, need, or proximity. In the chapter we sketch these developments in detail.
Food and Nutrition Bulletin
Background:Recently, adolescence has been identified as a second window of opportunity for the co... more Background:Recently, adolescence has been identified as a second window of opportunity for the correction of nutritional inadequacies. However, there is a lack of knowledge on evidence-based integrated nutrition strategies for adolescents in Indonesia.Objective:To provide a research agenda and the prioritization of research actions to tackle outstanding knowledge gaps on adolescent nutrition in Indonesia.Methods:A preliminary set of research topics was listed based on a desk study of the academic literature and policy documents. Second, a stakeholder meeting was held to further identify and discuss research topics related to adolescent nutrition in Indonesia. Third, an online survey was conducted in which respondents were asked to indicate priority research themes for the next 3 to 5 years and to rank a total of 23 research questions.Results:Most (52%) of the respondents who returned the survey (n = 27) prioritize research on implementation and program evaluation, while 30% prefer d...
In general, historical demographic studies and research on stratification and social mobility ten... more In general, historical demographic studies and research on stratification and social mobility tend to ignore intra-family differences. In this study, we postulate that marriage timing and marriage chances can serve as proxy for life chances in general, and that these are subject to an unequal distribution of resources within families. We have discovered that diversity in marriage/life chances can be explained by intra-family differences in gender and birth position, by inter-family differences in family size, as well as by interactions between these two. Firstly, we have found evidence that the advantage of eldest children is by and large a myth. Eldest boys had no real advantage over boys in the middle, whereas girls in the middle were clearly privileged over eldest girls. Secondly, we have found partial proof for the resource dilution hypothesis, in the sense that a larger number of girls (not boys) retarded marriage timing. Interestingly, the negative effect on marriage of being ...
The History of The Family, 2010
Demography
The lagging fertility transition in West Africa has important repercussions for global population... more The lagging fertility transition in West Africa has important repercussions for global population growth but remains poorly understood. Inspired by Caldwell and colleagues' fertility transition framework, as well as by subsequent research, we examine diversity in women's holistic childbearing trajectories in Niakhar, Senegal, between the early 1960s and 2018 using a sequence analysis approach. We evaluate the prevalence of different trajectories, their contribution to overall fertility levels, and their association with women's socioeconomic and cultural characteristics. Four trajectories were observed: “high fertility,” “delayed entry,” “truncated,” and “short.” While the high fertility trajectory was most prevalent across cohorts, delayed entry grew in importance. The high fertility trajectory was more common among women born between 1960 and 1969 and was followed less often by divorced women and those from polygynous households. Women with primary education and those ...
Bijdragen en Mededelingen betreffende de Geschiedenis der Nederlanden, 2011
The twentieth century has witnessed tremendous change in marriage and conjugal relations, ranging... more The twentieth century has witnessed tremendous change in marriage and conjugal relations, ranging from the first sexual revolution of the 1920s, the “golden age of marriage” during the 1950s and 1960s, to the “implosion” of marriage and the growth of divorce, cohabitation, singlehood, and same-sex and blended families in recent decades. The shifts in the ties that bound twentieth-century people into marriage had important repercussions for their bonds with family, friends, neighbors, and community and vice versa. This chapter traces how people’s marital ties evolved from the 1920s to the present and how social networks, pivoting around the conjugal bond, have altered. It does so by focusing on four broad questions. First, why and how did marital relations change and how are these changes understood in their historical context? Second, how did people’s broader personal networks alter during this period? What sorts of ties were important? What roles did friends, family and kin, and neighbors and community members play? Third, how did these changes differ across gender, social class, time, and space? Fourth, what did changing ties mean for people’s well-being, for instance in terms of loneliness, divorce, and the quality and stability of relations? The chapter addresses these questions through a broad synthesis of scholarship for five periods of significant change: the 1920s, the 1930s to 1940s, the 1950s to 1960s, the 1970s, and the 1980s to present. We present examples from the United Kingdom, the United States, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Japan, Korea, and Ukraine. We compare Western and non-Western societies where possible, but the majority of our evidence is on Western societies. We also compare norms, values, and practices across family systems with either “strong” or “weak” ties. In “strong ties” regions and groups, individuals’ bonds to kin, family, neighbors, and community are most important, while in family systems marked by “weak ties,” non-kin connections predominate. We distinguish also between collectivist societies, which emphasize the group and its interests, and individualist societies, which promote the interests of the individual over those of the state or group. Since the 1920s, people in most Western societies have witnessed vast swings in the importance of the marital tie in relation to other social connections. While social configurations during the nineteenth and early twentieth century had been broadly composed, consisting of close ties to parents, siblings, neighbors, and same-sex friends, as of the 1920s the conjugal relation became increasingly more central. During the 1950s and 1960s the prominence of the marriage tie was at its peak. Since the 1970s, the pendulum has swung back again to a situation in which a much wider configuration of social connections is important. Different from the nineteenth century, however, contemporary social networks comprise relations of choice rather than ties of blood, need, or proximity. In the chapter we sketch these developments in detail.
Food and Nutrition Bulletin
Background:Recently, adolescence has been identified as a second window of opportunity for the co... more Background:Recently, adolescence has been identified as a second window of opportunity for the correction of nutritional inadequacies. However, there is a lack of knowledge on evidence-based integrated nutrition strategies for adolescents in Indonesia.Objective:To provide a research agenda and the prioritization of research actions to tackle outstanding knowledge gaps on adolescent nutrition in Indonesia.Methods:A preliminary set of research topics was listed based on a desk study of the academic literature and policy documents. Second, a stakeholder meeting was held to further identify and discuss research topics related to adolescent nutrition in Indonesia. Third, an online survey was conducted in which respondents were asked to indicate priority research themes for the next 3 to 5 years and to rank a total of 23 research questions.Results:Most (52%) of the respondents who returned the survey (n = 27) prioritize research on implementation and program evaluation, while 30% prefer d...
In general, historical demographic studies and research on stratification and social mobility ten... more In general, historical demographic studies and research on stratification and social mobility tend to ignore intra-family differences. In this study, we postulate that marriage timing and marriage chances can serve as proxy for life chances in general, and that these are subject to an unequal distribution of resources within families. We have discovered that diversity in marriage/life chances can be explained by intra-family differences in gender and birth position, by inter-family differences in family size, as well as by interactions between these two. Firstly, we have found evidence that the advantage of eldest children is by and large a myth. Eldest boys had no real advantage over boys in the middle, whereas girls in the middle were clearly privileged over eldest girls. Secondly, we have found partial proof for the resource dilution hypothesis, in the sense that a larger number of girls (not boys) retarded marriage timing. Interestingly, the negative effect on marriage of being ...
The History of The Family, 2010
Demography
The lagging fertility transition in West Africa has important repercussions for global population... more The lagging fertility transition in West Africa has important repercussions for global population growth but remains poorly understood. Inspired by Caldwell and colleagues' fertility transition framework, as well as by subsequent research, we examine diversity in women's holistic childbearing trajectories in Niakhar, Senegal, between the early 1960s and 2018 using a sequence analysis approach. We evaluate the prevalence of different trajectories, their contribution to overall fertility levels, and their association with women's socioeconomic and cultural characteristics. Four trajectories were observed: “high fertility,” “delayed entry,” “truncated,” and “short.” While the high fertility trajectory was most prevalent across cohorts, delayed entry grew in importance. The high fertility trajectory was more common among women born between 1960 and 1969 and was followed less often by divorced women and those from polygynous households. Women with primary education and those ...