Marriage
From Encyclopædia
The institution of marriage is the socially recognized union between a man and a woman that serves to legitimate their children. In most societies of the
world, husband and wife live together--either with or near the natal families of one or the other or else in a new household more or less independent of their families. Because a primary, although not essential, purpose of marriage is the procreation of children, sex is always recognized as a legitimate part of marriage (although in some cultures marriage is not the only institution for approved sexual activity).In almost all societies husbands and wives divide economic activities and domestic work between them according to traditional and approved ideas of man's and woman's work; which sex does precisely what tasks varies considerably from place to place, however. All societies create around marriage a host of related cultural features having a lesser or greater degree of elaboration, which makes marriage superficially one of the most complex and varied of all human institutions.MARRIAGE: A SOCIAL INSTITUTIONA conventional marriage in most cultures follows a chain of typical events in a predictable order. The initial
stage involves some sort of courtship or, in some cultures, an arrangement by a marriage broker, which
leads to a wedding of the bride and the groom. The wedding itself functions as a rite of passage (see
PASSAGE, RITES OF). Particular details of the wedding ceremony and other activities associated with the event vary according to a particular culture's customs and, within socially accepted boundaries, the wishes of the principals or their kinfolk. After the wedding phase the marital relationship gradually matures and changes as the married pair age and as children are born and grow up.These three
stages in marriage are almost universally recognizable, although the biological processes of maturing and aging are supplemented by widely divergent cultural expectations from one society to another. The termination of marriage, either with the death of one of the spouses or by
divorce, marks the fourth and final
stage. Widowed or divorced persons may or may not be allowed to remarry and go through the marital cycle once more.Before MarriageMarriages are either arranged between families (usually with some right of veto by the bride or groom) or are begun through a courtship in which the partners have found one another. Arranged marriages are predominant primarily in societies that place great importance on
property inheritance, on linkages between lineages, or in which elders think that
young people are unable to make sound choices.China, India, and the Middle East are among the many parts of the
world in which societies traditionally have practiced arranged marriages. In such societies careful
attention is usually paid to the health, work habits, character, and family background of the bride and groom so as to ensure a successful match. In marriages between members of the royalty or the upper class, family background traditionally has been the only important consideration, but such marriages generally have not been measured by the same criteria as have those between members of other social classes.Arranged marriages, taken as a whole, work as well as any other form of marriage. The bride and the groom tend to expect far less, and the roles are far more clearly spelled out than in societies in which people select their own spouses. People who choose their marital partners for themselves, on the other
hand, often demand more from marriage--and may get it. Often, however, they are more likely to bring into the marriage unconscious ideas of what they want that, because they are unrecognized and unstated, the spouse cannot possibly fulfill. Such unconscious demands may cloud the success of self-selecting marriages. It is far more difficult to define "a good husband" or "a good wife" in societies in which people select their own
mates than in societies in which marriages are arranged.The WeddingThe wedding is an occurrence before which the marriage union can be called off but after which the partners can be legally separated only by death,
divorce, or annulment.In traditional Eskimo culture the wedding is no more than the actual moving of bride and groom into the same household. In most societies, however, weddings are marked by celebration--a public statement that a marriage has been established. In the West a wedding must be performed by an official of the state or by a member of the clergy, who is declared an official of the state for this purpose. In some European countries a civil ceremony is required before a religious one is valid.In traditional societies in many parts of the
world, notably among the tribal peoples of
Africa, the wedding occurs as a
stage in a series of payments known as BRIDE-PRICE, or bridewealth (less commonly, in payments of groomwealth). Such payments are not to be confused with the gifts that are exchanged at weddings in many societies, or with
dowry, which is the bride's
property that she brings with her into the marriage. The exchange of bride-price in no way implies the selling of the bride. Rather, the payment is made for rights acquired in marriage to the bride, which may include the right to affiliate her children to the husband's lineage or
clan, rights to
property, sexual rights, and rights to labor. The latter may consist of the bride's labor in maintaining the household, to be interlinked with the work of other members of the household, as well as the rewards of labor performed by the bride outside the household.In theory, at least, such rights as those granted through the bride-price exchange are always reciprocated in one form or another by both marriage partners. Thus, for every right a spouse enjoys, that spouse has an obligation. Such sets of reciprocal obligations and rights associated with marriage are recognized universally, although both historically and culturally they have differed widely and may not be granted equal weight in any two given cultures.The Course of the MarriageA marriage matures as the husband and wife grow older and be?ome more experienced. The arrival of a child puts a marriage on a new plane: the marriage partners face an important new set of roles--not just the roles of father and mother but those of co-parent.In some cultures the standard of behavior for parents is rigidly enforced by society and leaves little room for deviation. In others, as in modern Western society, such roles are less clearly defined, and questions of parenting can
lead to considerable tension between the spouses or between the child's parents and grandparents.In some societies a person is not considered to have reached adulthood before he or she marries, no matter at what age. In a few cultures, including that of the Tiv of Nigeria, a person is not considered fully an adult until he or she becomes a parent.Plural MarriageAlthough MONOGAMY, the marriage of one man and one woman at a time, is the rule in Western society, many other cultures allow plural marriage, or
polygamy. In many traditional African and Asian societies men are allowed to have more than one wife at a time, a practice called polygyny. The early books of the Old Testament contain many references to polygyny. A few societies--most of them in
Central Asia--traditionally allow a woman to have more than one husband at a time, called polyandry. Although an extremely rare custom, known only from the Himalayan region, a few societies traditionally have allowed polygyny and polyandry simultaneously, a practice termed polygyandry.People involved in plural marriages generally have sought different rewards in marriage from those sought in a monogamous union. In various polygynous cultures of
Africa, for example, a man's having many
heirs traditionally enhances his social position; the fact that a woman has many teammates results in greater cooperation both in agriculture or other domestic work and in seeing that all the wives get a fair share of the household
property and benefits.
divorce and RemarriageIn most cultures
divorce is allowed, and divorced persons may, and often do, remarry. Some cultures, including that of the Brahman
castes of India, traditionally do not allow widows to remarry, however. In various societies in which bride-price is paid as part of marriage, a widow may be inherited by one of her husband's kinsmen. If she is too old to bear children, she may elect not to be inherited. If she is inherited and does not like her new husband, called her levir, usually she is free to seek
divorce. Early anthropologists wrote a great deal about the levirate--the term correctly refers to the
inheritance of widows, but sometimes it is used to refer to the kind of polygyny in which a widowed woman marries her deceased husband's brother, as occurred among the ancient Hebrew tribes.In a few places, if a young woman dies her sister is sent to replace her as wife; this custom, called the sororate, traditionally was common among various North American Indian peoples. If a man marries two living sisters, usually because he was taught to believe that sisters can get along as co-wives better than unrelated women, that, too, may be called sororate.MARRIAGE: A LEGAL DEFINITIONAlthough the expression the marriage
contract is often used in everyday
speech, marriage is technically what is known as an anomalous
contract and from a legal standpoint is not to be confused with other forms of
contract. In the West marriage is a matter of family law, not
contract law. Family law dictates whom one can marry and sets forth minimum ages for marriage. It governs the law of
divorce and, to some degree, of
property.
