Key to Exercise XXX

1.What are the main features of modern Chinese families? I. Discuss the following questions with your partner and then come up with your answers. 1.What are the main features of modern Chinese families? The small size, simple structure and diversified patterns of family have become the main features of modern Chinese families. Along with social progress and epochal change, the size and structure of traditional Chinese families have undergone changes.

Small size, simple structure and diversified patterns of families have become the main features of modern Chinese families. Since the introduction of the reform and opening-up policy, to adapt to changes in the mode of social production and the style of life, traditional families of complicated structure and big size have been gradually transformed into families of simple structure and small size.

2.What do you think leads to the change in family patterns? The free flow of labors and the change in marriage and family concepts constitute the main reasons for the change in family patterns. Experts hold that under the condition of China's market economy, industrialized production and modern life, the rapid development of the non-agricultural sector and migrant farmer workers in cities in particular, require the free flow of labor. The big family pattern with several generations living under the same roof and burden caused by the old, the weak, the sick and the disabled hinders the economic development and personal progress. Therefore, small families of simple structure and easy flow of labor have become the objective of people's pursuit.

Alteration in marriage and family concept constitutes another reason behind the change in Chinese family size, pattern and style. With the advancement of urbanization and modernization in China, in their pursuit of greater personal value and more enjoyment of life, more and more people, with the exception of the passive unmarried people, have chosen to remain single or prefer late marriage, which has resulted in the decline in the fertility rate. Additionally, the increase in cohabitation has also posed a challenge to the traditional Chinese family patterns.

3.Why do some people say the Chinese government has to pay a heavy price down the road of family planning programme? Birth control policies are man's attempt to interfere with the natural propagation of families. Such policies do slow population growth, but societies pay a heavy price down the road. How will these spoiled "little emperors" face life's challenges? With ever-rising social security and health insurance costs, even more daunting will be the load these children must carry in caring for their parents and grandparents while starting their own families. According to a 2006 statistic, eleven and a half percent of the Chinese population is over 60.

It is projected that by the year 2030 China will face a grave aging crisis with a small minority of young adults tending to the needs of a large majority of elderly and children. It will not be possible for individual nuclear families to provide security for the old, and that ball will inevitably drop in the lap of the government. China's economic advancement very likely will stall as a result. The Chinese government now sees the long-term ramifications of its policy, but it is probably already too late to prevent its consequences. In 20 years the entire county will feel the weight its urban families are feeling today.

II. Fill in each of the following blanks with an appropriate word or phrase chosen from the text. 1.Family; smaller; impact 2.orphans; spiritual 3.pressure; filial 4.tranquility; cultural 5.interaction; family; quality 6.family; success 7.farms; disintegrates 8.issue; education; tuition 9.structures; elderly 10.economic; family