The family is considered as one of the oldest social institution and has often been regarded as the cornerstone of societies. Haralambos and Holborn (Sociology Themes and Perspectives pg. 64) argues that in pre-modern and modern societies alike, families have been seen as the most basic unit of social organization which carries out vital tasks such as the socialization of children. To effectively argue for or against the statement that “The family in a contemporary Caribbean society is described as dysfunctional,” we must first adequately define the key words in this statement. The word family has different definitions due to the varying world cultures. Nasser Mustapha has sited George Peter Murdock in his book Sociology for Caribbean Student as identifying a family as “a social group characterized by common residence, economic cooperation and reproduction”. Dysfunctional is the adjective of dysfunction and the word dysfunction is defined as impaired or abnormal functioning. Finally the word contemporary as listed in the Pocket Oxford Dictionary is defined as belonging to or occurring in the present or modern in style. With these key terms defined I will seek to look at what are the key functions of the family, how the family function affects the family, how society affects the function of the family and why the family is viewed dysfunctional. The family as a unit performs numerous functions. The functions of a family are as follows: procreation, socialization and an economic unit. Most families begin with the marriage or sexual partnership of a man and a woman, which in majority of cases produces one or more children; this is called procreation. The average number of children each woman has is called the fertility rate. In a family it is wise to plan the number of children they will have. In society the parents of a family is responsible for the care and socialization of their children. They are also in charge of providing for