Partnering and becoming parents in cosmopolitanized late modernity: Experiences of Tongan-European Australian intercultural couples

This qualitative sociological study explored how Tongan-European Australian intercultural couples negotiated self, tradition and family in the course of partnering and becoming parents in cosmopolitanized late modernity. Interviews were conducted with individual partners in eight couples, and analyzed in relation to the individualization thesis. The research found that the influence of individualization on couples’ experiences was limited. Familialist ways of ‘doing family’, gender, and socio-economic background were also important, and intercultural encounters led to both de-traditionalization and re-traditionalization. The research advances understandings of partnering and parenting in diverse family contexts and extends theories of social change in late modernity.