J.D. Vance, author of Hillbilly Elegy, is, by any measure, functionally successful. A Marine who served in Iraq, graduate of Ohio State, graduate of Yale Law School, and an editor on the Yale Law Journal. Yet, his nuclear family of origin and extended family are low in level of differentiation. Not the lowest, but low. Individually, he’s probably somewhat higher than the system as a whole.
My guess, for a long time, has been that level of differentiation and functional success have a low but significant correlation with each other. But the number of exceptions to that association are so numerous as to make that correlation useless by itself. J.D. Vance is a glaring exception.
He and his half-sister Lindsay are functionally successful so far; yet they have no siblings that are lower than the family average, as you would expect to see in multigenerational transmission process.
And what exactly is the family in this case? See the provisional family diagram at the end of this file. His mother, Bev or Mom, had five marriages and multiple ‘relationships’, chronic addictions, many moves and family disruptions with a shifting cast of characters. So it’s hard to apply Bowen’s insights about multigenerational transmission process to Vance’s nuclear family of origin; hard to define what his nuclear family of origin is.
Bowen’s transmission of level of differentiation across generations is still true, from what I see, but you have to be flexible about how you apply the emotional truth of the concept.
Part of the problem is what gets defined as the nuclear family of origin, when level of differentiation of the family is low. At low levels of differentiation, there is little or no solid self in the system, fluid porous boundaries, shifting definitions of family.
What we see in Vance’s family is often seen in low differentiation families. If there is an emotionally stable part of the family, it may reside in the person of a grandparent, aunt, or uncle, not in the technically defined nuclear family of origin.
The emotional truths of Bowen theory remain solid, but they have to be applied to something other than the conventionally defined family. Low differentiation families sometimes have recognizable nuclear families, but often not.
How does all this apply to J.D. Vance and his family? His mother Bev was the focused-on patient in her family of origin(Paul Olsen pointed this out to me before I saw it.). Severe addictions, multiple marital and other relationships, only episodic effective functioning. Her two siblings, Jimmy and Lori, seem to have had moderately effective functioning. Her family of origin with the parents Mamaw and Papaw was stable over many years, though turbulent and symptomatic at times. The Bowen patterns can easily apply to that nuclear family. Family projection process and multigenerational transmission process apply well to the Mamaw-Papaw nuclear family.
Vance and his sister were more like Bev’s siblings than her children. Functionally, Mamaw and Papaw were the emotional parents of J.D. and Lindsay.
That twosome apparently benefited from their mother’s poor functioning, as we often see in intense family projection process.
The functioning of J.D. and Lindsay was supported by the emotional reliability of Mamaw and Papaw. Protection, sanctuary, encouragement, clear values, a stable home, positive projections from Mamaw and Papaw.
Vance is silent on many facts about the family, despite being extraordinarily direct about much of the family’s functioning.
References
Bowen, M. (1978). Family therapy in clinical practice. New York: J. Aronson.
Kerr, M. E., & Bowen, M. (1988). Family evaluation: An approach based on Bowen theory. New York: Norton.
Vance, J. D. (2016). Hillbilly elegy: A memoir of a family and culture in crisis. New York, NY: Harper, an imprint of HarperCollins.
Jim Edd, The way you are seeing the emotional process in this family makes sense to me. You could say, as I think you do, that the sibling group includes the brother’s and half-sister’s mother, who is the “sibling” who develops with the lower level of differentiation, and thereby absorbs more of the stress of the system. I frequently meet blended families, and I wonder if, in addition to its being harder to wrap my head around the whole system, it is also more challenging to assist individuals in complex dispersed systems to work toward DoS. For instance, how does a young adult engage the triangle with parents who are divorced and have little or no contact? How do you see the cultural and economic context interacting with the multigenerational process? Thank you for these ideas about functional success correlated with DoS. Will be interesting to see how Vance’s own children function . . .
This is a really interesting piece. In some families it is difficult to find the strength in the system or there is a significant cut off with the past generation that is hard to bridge. These grandparents provided stability for the grandchildren that was not possible for their parents to do. It is humbling to think that the grandparent’s stability came at the expense of one of their children. It is even more humbling to know we all participate in this process.
Very humbling. Worth noting that these grandparents provided stability in spite of their own low differentiation.
Jim Edd,
I did send a comment but looks like it hasn’t been approved. I hope you saw it.
Stephanie
Jim Edd,
I have been thinking about Hillbilly Elergy as a case study on the interface between socioeconomic status and differentiation of self. As you say, there is no straightforward correlation, but there is an important association. Vance’s description of the multigenerational family with its conflicts and loyalties, and a chronically high level of reactivity, indicates a low level of differentiation. What worked for him, I think, and suggests his own somewhat higher level of differentiaion was his ability to find resources, within himself and within and beyond the family, to work his way to a better life. Your diagram and your identifying the elements of emotional process helps me to see more than I did reading the book. I wonder if the string of miscarriages between the birth of Jimmy and Bev might partially account for the intense focus on Bev.
Yes on the miscarriages. It has to have amped up the intensity.
Jim Edd,
it’s still before 10 pm here , maybe you’ll see this before June.
1. I think the resilience literature that talks about having a relationship with a functional adult when the nuclear family is so low functioning misses the emotional system and the interconnectedness of functioning and under functioning family members.
2. I think the effort to clearly identify the emotional process is important and it is encouraging when knowledgeable people agree about the processes they are observing. Agreement is not necessary for differentiation but it is for science.
3. I think the group that Vance’s family represents is a new object of projection in society and that the blame they feel about their difficulty adapting to change elected our current president and their views that derive from their stuck position have been adopted to guide political decisions at the highest level. Catering to their weakness also benefits the ones who benefit from an old order that cannot sustain us into the future.
I read this book as a fascinating portrayal of a segment of society that I know little about, but I really appreciate this Bowen view of the author’s family. I wondered what left him free enough to succeed so well — at least based on achievements. Thanks for this analysis.