Preparing modern nurses for postmodern families.

Abstract

Postmodern insights that have occurred across the social sciences and in limited areas of nursing are focused on the field of family nursing. The article describes postmodern families against the background of cultural changes that have influenced the conditions of those families. Nurses can practice more appropriately if they have an understanding of how postmodern thought has influenced the science and subsequent theoretical explanations of families. Initial insights are offered relating postmodernism and theories of family therapy. Practice roles are described that are believed to be more appropriate and effective when nursing occurs in the context of diversity, relativity, and value plurality that characterizes postmodern families.