When Marriage Disappears:
Who Marries, Who Doesn't, & Why It's Important to the Welfare of Our Children and Country
Presentation by W. Bradford Wilcox, Director of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia
February 22, 2012, 4:00-6:00pm
Faculty Club at the University of California Berkeley
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IN MIDDLE AMERICA, MARRIAGE IS IN TROUBLE. Among the affluent, marriage is stable and may even be getting stronger. Among the poor, marriage continues to be fragile and weak. But the most consequential marriage trend of our time concerns the broad center of our society, where marriage, that iconic middle-class institution, is foundering. This talk will show how marriage is foundering in Middle America, explore why this is happening, and explain why the disappearance of marriage in Middle America matters to our children and our country.
W. Bradford Wilcox is Director of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia, Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Virginia, and a member of the James Madison Society at Princeton University.
He earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Virginia and his Ph.D. at Princeton University. Prior to coming to the University of Virginia, he held research fellowships at Princeton University, Yale University and the Brookings Institution.
Mr. Wilcox's research focuses on marriage, parenthood, and cohabitation, and on the ways that gender, religion, and children influence the quality and stability of American marriages and family life. He has published articles on marriage, cohabitation, parenting, and fatherhood in The American Sociological Review, Social Forces, The Journal of Marriage and Family and The Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. His first book, Soft Patriarchs, New Men: How Christianity Shapes Fathers and Husbands (Chicago, 2004), examines the ways in which the religious beliefs and practices of American Protestant men influence their approach to parenting, household labor, and marriage. With Nicholas Wolfinger, Wilcox is now writing a book titled, Soul Mates: Religion, Sex, Children, & Marriage among African Americans and Latinos, for Oxford University Press. With Eric Kaufmann, Wilcox is editing a book on the causes and consequences of low fertility in the West.
Professor Wilcox has received the following two awards from the American Sociological Association Religion Section for his research: the Best Graduate Paper Award and the Best Article Award. His research has also been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, BBC News, The Atlantic, The Washington Post, USA Today, The Boston Globe, CNN, The Los Angeles Times, CBS News, NBC's The Today Show, and on NPR. He also writes regularly for publications like The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.
Bradford Wilcox teaches courses in statistics, family, and religion. Professor Wilcox also regularly consults with companies working in the juvenile products industry on demographic trends in the United States.
For more information about the National Marriage Project, click here.
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