marriage, socially sanctioned union that reproduces the family family, a basic unit of social structure, the exact definition of which can vary greatly from time to time and from culture to culture. How a society defines family as a primary group, and the functions it asks families to perform, are by no means constant.
..... Click the link for more information. . In all societies the choice of partners is generally guided by rules of exogamy (the obligation to marry outside a group); some societies also have rules of endogamy (the obligation to marry within a group). These rules may be prescriptive or, as in the case of the incest incest, sexual relations between persons to whom marriage is prohibited by custom or law because of their close kinship . Ideas of kinship, however, vary widely from group to group, hence the definition of incest also varies.
..... Click the link for more information. taboo, proscriptive; they generally apply to kinship groups such as clan clan, social group based on actual or alleged unilineal descent from a common ancestor. Such groups have been known in all parts of the world and include some that claim the parentage or special protection of an animal, plant, or other object (see totem ).
..... Click the link for more information. or lineage; residential groups; and social groups such as the ethnic group, caste caste [Port., casta=basket], ranked groups based on heredity within rigid systems of social stratification, especially those that constitute Hindu India. Some scholars, in fact, deny that true caste systems are found outside India.
..... Click the link for more information. , or class.

Marriage is usually heterosexual and entails exclusive rights and duties of sexual performance, but there are instructive exceptions. For example, Nayar women of India would ritually marry men of a superior caste, have numerous lovers, and bear legitimate children. Among the Dahomey of West Africa, one woman could marry another; the first woman would be the legal "father" of the children (by other men) of the second. These examples highlight the functions of marriage to reproduce both a domestic division of labor and social relationships between different groups. Such functions are served even by the more common type of marriage, the union of one or more men with one or more women.

In most societies men and women are valued for their different roles in the household economy. Marriage therefore often occasions other economic exchanges. If a woman's labor is highly valued, a man may be required to offer valuable goods (bride-price) or his own labor (bride-service) to his wife's family. If a man's labor is more highly valued, the bride's family may offer goods (dowry) to the husband or his family.

Marriage as a Societal Bond

In many societies marriage links not just nuclear families but larger social formations as well. Some endogamous societies are divided into different exogamous groups (such as clans or lineages): Men form alliances through the exchange of women, and the social organization regulates these alliances through marriage rules. In some cases, two men from different groups exchange sisters for brides. Other instances involve an adult man marrying the young or infant daughter of another man; sexual relations would be deferred for many years, but the two men will have formed a strong bond. Marriages are often arranged by the families through the services of a matchmaker or go-between, and commence with a ritual celebration, or wedding. Some cultures practice trial marriage; the couple lives together before deciding whether they should marry. Society generally prescribes where newlywed couples should live: In patrilocal cultures, they live with or near the husband's family; in matrilocal ones, with or near the wife's family. Under neolocal residence, the couple establishes their own household.

Although marriage tends to be regarded in many places as a permanent tie, divorce is allowed in most modern societies. The causes of divorce vary, but adultery, desertion, infertility, failure to provide the necessities of life, mistreatment, and incompatibility are the most common. Civil unions are now permitted in Western countries, but for nearly a thousand years marriage in the Western world was a religious contract. The Christian church undertook its supervision in the 9th cent., when newlywed couples instituted the practice of coming to the church door to have their union blessed by the priest. Eventually the church regulated marriage through canon law. In contemporary N Europe marriage has lost some of importance, especially as social legislation has emphasized assuring equal financial benefits and legal standing to children born to unwed parents.

For the legal aspects of marriage, see husband and wife husband and wife, the legal aspects of the married state (for the sociological aspects, see marriage ).

The Marriage Contract

Marriage is a contractual relationship between a man and a woman that vests the parties with a new legal status.
..... Click the link for more information. ; consanguinity consanguinity (kŏn'săng-gwĭn`ĭtē), state of being related by blood or descended from a common ancestor.
..... Click the link for more information. ; divorce divorce, partial or total dissolution of a marriage by the judgment of a court. Partial dissolution is a divorce "from bed and board," a decree of judicial separation , leaving the parties officially married while forbidding cohabitation.
..... Click the link for more information. .

Forms of Marriage

Monogamy (the union of one wife to one husband) is the prevalent form almost everywhere. Polygyny (or polygamy; having several wives at one time), however, has been a prerogative in many societies (see harem harem (hâr`əm) [Arabic], term applied to women's apartments in a Muslim household.
..... Click the link for more information. ). It is commonly found where the value of women's labor is high and may be practiced as a way of acquiring allies: A man may cement his bonds with several other men by marrying their sisters or daughters. Polyandry (having several husbands at one time) is rare, having occurred infrequently in Tibetan society, among the Marquesas of Polynesia, and among certain hill tribes in India. People who enjoy only a marginal subsistence may practice polyandry as a way of limiting births. It is also practiced where brothers must work together to sustain one household; they share one wife. The custom of marrying a widow to her late husband's brother is known as levirate marriage and was common among the ancient Hebrews. In sororate marriages a widower marries his deceased (or barren) wife's sister. The levirate and the sororate occur in societies where marriage is seen to create an alliance between groups; the deceased spouse's group has a duty to provide a new spouse to the widow or widower, thereby preserving the alliance. In recent years many gay-rights groups have sought official recognition of same-sex couples that would be comparable to marriage (see gay-rights movement gay-rights movement, organized efforts to end the criminalization of homosexuality and protect the civil rights of homosexuals. While there was some organized activity on behalf of the rights of homosexuals from the mid-19th through the first half of the 20th cent.
..... Click the link for more information. ).

Bibliography

See C. Levi-Strauss, The Elementary Structures of Kinship (1969); E. A. Westermark, The History of Human Marriage (3 vol., 5th ed. 1921; repr. 1971); J. M. Henslin, Marriage and Family in a Changing Society (2d ed. 1985); J. F. Collier, Marriage and Inequality in Classless Societies (1988).

marriage

Legally and socially sanctioned union, usually between a man and a woman, that is regulated by laws, rules, customs, beliefs, and attitudes that prescribe the rights and duties of the partners and accords status to their offspring (if any). The universality of marriage is attributed to the many basic social and personal functions it performs, such as procreation, regulation of sexual behaviour, care of children and their education and socialization, regulation of lines of descent, division of labour between the sexes, economic production and consumption, and satisfaction of personal needs for social status, affection, and companionship. Until modern times marriage was rarely a matter of free choice, and it was rarely motivated by romantic love. In most eras and most societies, permissible marriage partners have been carefully regulated. In societies in which the extended family remains the basic unit, marriages are usually arranged by the family. The assumption is that love between the partners comes after marriage, and much thought is given to the socioeconomic advantages accruing to the larger family from the match. Some form of dowry or bridewealth is almost universal in societies that use arranged marriages. The rituals and ceremonies surrounding marriage are associated primarily with religion and fertility and validate the importance of marriage for the continuation of a family, clan, tribe, or society. In recent years the definition of marriage as a union between members of opposite sexes has been challenged, and in 2000 The Netherlands became the first country to legalize same-sex marriages. See also bridewealth; divorce; dowry; exogamy and endogamy; polygamy.

Marriage

American linden

symbol of marriage. [Plant Symbolism: Flora Symbolica, 182]

Aphrodite Genetrix

patron of marriage and procreation. [Gk. Myth.: Espy, 16]

As You Like It

its denouement has the marriages of four couples. [Br. Lit.: Shakespeare As You Like It]

Benedick

nickname for groom; derived from Shakespeare’s Benedick. [Br. Lit.: Much Ado About Nothing]

Blondie and Dagwood

typify relationship between dominant wife and her inadequate mate. [Comics: Berger, 108]

Bridal Chorus

traditional wedding song; from Wagner’s Lohengrin. [Music: Scholes, 1113]

Cana

wedding feast where Christ made water into wine. [N.T.: John 2:1–11]

Doll’s House, A

after eight years of marriage, in which Torvald Helmer has treated Nora more like a doll than a human being, she declares her independence. [Nor. Drama: Ibsen A Doll’s House]

epithalamium

poem in honor of bride and groom. [Western Lit.: LLEI, 1: 283]

Erato

Muse of bridal songs. [Gk. Myth.: Kravitz, 90]

Frome, Ethan

his loveless and unhappy marriage to Zeena remains hopeless when his love affair with Mattie comes to a pitiful end. [Am. Lit.: Ethan Frome in Benét, 324]

Gretna Green

place in Scotland, just across the English border, where elopers could be married without formalities. [Br. Hist.: Brewer Dictionary, 418]

Hulda

goddess of marriage and fecundity. [Ger. Myth.: Benét, 484]

huppah

bridal canopy in Jewish weddings. [Judaism: Wigoder, 274]

Marriage à la Mode

engravings in which Hogarth satirically depicts the daily lives of a countess and an earl. [Br. Art: EB (1963) XI, 625]

Modern Love

dramatizes the feelings of a couple whose marriage is dying. [Br. Lit.: George Meredith Modern Love in Magill IV, 899]

orange blossoms

traditional decoration for brides. [Br. and Fr. Tradition: Brewer Dictionary, 784]

Prothalamion

Spenser’s poem celebrating the double marriage of the two daughters of the Earl of Worcester. [Br. Poetry: Haydn & Fuller, 615]

quince

in portraits, traditionally held by woman in wedding. [Art: Hall, 257]

rice

newly married couples pelted with rice for connubial good luck. [Western Folklore: Leach, 938]

St. Agnes’s Eve

when marriageable girls foresee their future husbands. [Br. Lit.: “The Eve of St. Agnes” in Norton, 686–693]

These Twain

difficult marital adjustments of Edwin Clayhanger and Hilda Lessways. [Br. Lit.: Bennett These Twain in Magill I, 148]

tin cans

put on car of newlyweds leaving ceremony. [Am. Cult.: Misc.]

Way of the World, The

profound analysis of the marriage relation in which Mirabell and Millamant negotiate a marriage agreement. [Br. Drama: Benét, 1077]

Wedding March

popular bridal music from Mendelssohn’s march in Midsummer Night’s Dream. [Music: Scholes, 1113]

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

marriage of George and Martha is a travesty, full of arguments, frustration, and hatred. [Am. Drama: Edward Albee Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf’? in Magill IV, 1282]

Wife of Bath

many marriages form theme of her tale. [Br. Lit.: Canterbury Tales, “Wife of Bath’s Tale]