In anthropology, the legitimate long-term mating arrangement institutionalized in a community. If a union is called marriage, this implies that husband and wife have recognized claims over their partners, often including material claims; and it renders the children born of such a union legitimate heirs to both parents. Marriage also creates relationships of affinity between a person and his or her spouse's relatives, and perhaps even directly between the relatives of the husband and wife. In many parts of the world a man may legitimately marry more than one wife (polygyny), but it is very unusual for a woman to be permitted more than one husband (polyandry). Polygyny is often associated with the payment of a bride-price by the groom or his family to the relatives of the bride. In other societies the wife may bring a dowry to her husband, particularly where a woman is expected to marry into a higher social class.
Generally, certain marriages are prohibited or discouraged: some are ruled out by incest restrictions; others by virtue of religion, social class, ethnicity, and (above all) by age, since almost universally the bride is expected to be younger than her husband. The actual pool of marriage partners is in practice often very restricted. Anthropologists have made a special study of societies where there is also a positive requirement, or a preference, for marriage with a woman who stands in a particular kinship relationship to her prospective husband. Many Muslim communities, for example, favour marriage between a man and his father's brother's daughter. In a number of other societies there is a strong preference for marriage with a mother's brother's daughter. The contemporary Western belief that young men and women should be free to choose their own marriage partner is historically very unusual. In most societies - including many Western communities - these decisions have been taken by the older generation.
| Family law |
|---|
| Entering into marriage |
| Prenuptial agreement · Marriage |
| Common-law marriage |
| Same-sex marriage |
| Legal states similar to marriage |
| Cohabitation · Civil union |
| Domestic partnership |
| Registered partnership |
| Dissolution of marriage |
| Annulment · Divorce · Alimony |
| Issues affecting children |
| Paternity · Legitimacy · Adoption |
| Legal guardian · Ward |
| Emancipation of minors |
| Parental responsibility |
| Contact (including Visitation) |
| Residence in English law |
| Custody · Child support |
| Areas of possible legal concern |
| Spousal abuse · Child abuse |
| Child abduction |
| Adultery · Bigamy · Incest |
| Conflict of Laws Issues |
| Marriage · Nullity · Divorce |
A marriage is a relationship between or among individuals, usually recognized by civil authority and/or bound by the religious beliefs of the participants.
In one form or another, marriage is found in virtually every society.
Purposes of marriage include security (derived from the solemn commitment to longevity in the relationship), companionship, procreation, child education and development, economic collaboration, and social stability.
In Western societies, marriage has traditionally been understood as a monogamous union, and, until the 21st century, only marriages between a man and a woman were recognised. In other parts of the world polygamy has been a common form of marriage.
Definitions
| Close Relationships |
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Affinity |
Precise definitions vary historically and between and within cultures: modern understanding emphasizes the legitimacy of sexual relations in marriage, yet the universal and unique attribute of marriage is the creation of affinal ties (in-laws). (Further discussion and reference: Marvin Harris, late Professor of Anthropology, Columbia University)
Marriage remains important as the socially sanctioned bond in a sexual relationship. Marriage is sometimes understood as a relationship designed to produce children and successfully socialize them.
Globally, most existing societies no longer allow polygamy as a form of marriage. For example, China shifted from allowing polygamy to supporting only monogamy in the Marriage Act of 1953 after the Communist revolution. Most of the world's population now live in societies where polygamy is less common and marriages are overwhelmingly monogamous.
Since the later decades of the 20th century many ideas about the nature and purpose of marriage and family have been challenged, in particular by LGBT social movements, which point out that marriage should not be exclusively heterosexual. Some people also argue that marriage may be an unnecessary legal fiction. since WWII, the West has seen a dramatic increase in divorce (6% to over 40% of first marriages), cohabitation without marriage, a growing unmarried population, children born outside of marriage (5% to over 33% of births), and an increase in adultery (8% to over 40%). In the United States there are two methods of receiving state recognition of a marriage: common law marriage and obtaining a marriage license. The majority of US states do not recognize common law marriage.
Marriage was strictly a civil institution until about the mid 5th century CE. Around that time Augustine and others theosophised about marriage and the Christian Church started taking an interest in co-opting it. Having always regarded it in practical terms as a relationship between a man and a woman, it was in the 12th century that the Church (the Catholic Church ), as well as other orthodoxies, formally defined marriage as a sacrament.
Marriage of some kind is found in most societies, and typically married people form a nuclear household, which is often subsequently extended biologically, through children.
The term wedlock is a synonym for marriage, and is mainly used in the phrase "out of wedlock" to describe a child born of parents who were not married.
Although legal same-sex marriage is prohibited in many locales, persons of all orientations enjoy equal marriage rights in the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, South Africa, and Canada.
Recognition
The participants in a marriage usually seek social recognition for their relationship, and many societies require official approval of a religious or civil body.
In many jurisdictions the civil marriage ceremony may take place during the religious marriage ceremony, although they are theoretically distinct. In most American states, the marriage may be officiated by a Priest, Minister, Rabbi or other religious authority, and in such a case the religious authority acts simultaneously as an agent of the state. Some states allow civil marriages in circumstances which are not allowed by many religions, such as same-sex marriages or civil unions, and marriage may also be created by the operation of the law alone as in common-law marriage, which is a judicial recognition that two people living as domestic partners are entitled to the effects of marriage. Examples include widows who stand to lose a pension if they remarry and so undergo a marriage only in the eyes of God and the community, homosexual couples (in locales where marriage equality is not the law), some sects which recognize polygamy, retired couples who would lose pension benefits if legally married, Muslim men who wish to engage in polygamy that is condoned in some situations under Islam, and immigrants who do not wish to alert the immigration authorities that they are married either to a spouse they are leaving behind or because the complexity of immigration laws may make it difficult for spouses to visit on a tourist visa.
In Europe it has traditionally been the churches' office to make marriages official by registering them. Hence, it was a significant step towards a clear separation of church and state and also an intended and effective weakening of the Christian churches' role in Germany, when Chancellor Otto von Bismarck introduced the Zivilehe (civil marriage) in 1875. This law made the declaration of the marriage before an official clerk of the civil administration (both spouses affirming their will to marry) the procedure to make a marriage legally valid and effective, and reduced the clerical marriage to a private ceremony.
Types of marriages
Marriage restrictions
Most nation-states still restrict marriage to two persons, one of each sex. There are five nations that have legislated marriage equality for same-sex couples, however: the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, South Africa, and Canada. Societies have always placed restrictions on marriage to relatives, though the degree of prohibited relationship varies widely. In many societies, marriage between some first cousins is preferred, while at the other extreme, the medieval Catholic church prohibited marriage even between distant cousins. The present day Catholic Church still maintains a standard of required distance (in both consanguinity and affinity) for marriage. In ancient India when Gurukul was in existence, the shishyas (the pupils) were advised against marrying any of Guru's children as shishyas were considered Guru's children and it would be considered marriage among siblings (though there were exceptions like Arjuna's son Abhimanyu marrying Uttra, the dance student of Arjuna in Mahabharata). The Hindu Marriage Act of 1955, brought reforms in the area of same gotra marriages. (Korean family names are divided into one or more clans.) Only intra-clan marriages are prohibited, as they are considered one type of exogamy.
Societies have also at times required marriage from within a certain group. Racist laws adopted by some societies in the past, such as Nazi-era Germany, apartheid-era South Africa and most of the United States in the first half of the 20th century, which prohibited marriage between persons of different races could also be considered examples of endogamy.
Cultures that practiced slavery might admit that slave marriages formed but grant them no legal status. Likewise, slave marriages in the United States were not binding, so that many contrabands escaping slavery during the American Civil War sought official status for their marriages. Among the rights distinguishing serfdom from slavery was the right to enter a legally recognizable marriage.
Weddings
The ceremony in which a marriage is enacted and announced to the community is called a wedding. A wedding in which a couple marry in the "eyes of the law" is called a civil marriage. Certain countries, like Belgium, Bulgaria and the Netherlands, demand that the civil marriage take place before any religious marriage. the officiant at the religious and community ceremony also serving as an agent of the state to enact the civil marriage. That does not mean that the state is "recognizing" religious marriages — the "civil" ceremony just takes place at the same time as the religious ceremony. If that civil element of the full ceremony is left out for any reason, in the eyes of the law no marriage took place, irrespective of the holding of the religious ceremony.
While some countries, such as Australia, permit marriages to be held in private and at any location, others, including England, require that the civil ceremony be conducted in a place specially sanctioned by law (i.e., a church or registry office), and be open to the public. Because of Australia's very relaxed rules on marriage, some celebrities (such as Michael Jackson) have opted to marry in Australia, so as to have a private ceremony.
The way in which a marriage is enacted has changed over time, as has the institution of marriage itself. In Europe during the Middle Ages, marriage was enacted by the couple promising verbally to each other that they would be married to each other; if made in the future tense ("I will marry you"), it would, by itself constitute a betrothal, but if the couple proceeded to have sexual relations, the union was a marriage. As part of the Reformation, the role of recording marriages and setting the rules for marriage passed to the state; by the 1600s many of the Protestant European countries had heavy state involvement in marriage.
Termination
In most societies, marriages end at the death of one of the partners, and in monogamous societies this allows the other partner to remarry. Many societies also provide for the termination of marriage through divorce. Marriages can also be annulled or cancelled, which is a legal proceeding that establishes that a marriage was invalid from its beginning.
Several cultures have practiced temporary and conditional marriages. Examples include the Celtic practice of handfasting and fixed-term marriages in the Muslim community. Pre-Islamic Arabs practiced a form of temporary marriage that carries on today in the practice of Nikah Mut'ah, a fixed-term marriage contract.
Rights and obligations relating to marriage
Typically, marriage is the institution through which people join together their lives in emotional and economic ways through forming a household.
Marriage sometimes establishes the legal father of a woman's child;
Marriage has traditionally been a prerequisite for having children, which many believe serves as the building block of a community and society. Thus, marriage not only serves the interests of the two individuals, but also the interests of their children and the society of which they are a part.
In most of the world's major religions, marriage is a prerequisite for sexual intercourse: unmarried people are not supposed to have sex, which is referred to as fornication and is socially discouraged or even criminalized.
See also: Rights and responsibilities of marriages in the United StatesMarriage and religion
Many religions have extensive teachings regarding marriage. Most Christian churches give some form of blessing to a marriage;
Liturgical Christian communions, notably Anglicanism, Catholicism, and Orthodoxy, consider marriage (sometimes termed holy matrimony) to be an expression of grace, termed a sacrament or mystery. Western Christians commonly term marriage a vocation, while Eastern Christians term it an ordination and a martyrdom, though the theological emphases indicated by the various appelations are not excluded by the catechetical teachings of either tradition. The sacrament of marriage is iconic of the relationship between Christ and the Church.
While most Reformed Christians would deny the elevation of marriage to the status of a sacrament, nonetheless it is considered a covenant between spouses before God.
In Judaism, marriage is viewed as a contractual bond commanded by God (Deuteronomy 24:1<noinclude> Despite the fact that children are not the singular goal of marriage, the rearing of children is an important aspect of it. Kabbalistically, marriage is understood to mean that the husband and wife are merging together into a single soul.
Islam also recommends marriage highly; By contrast, Buddhism does not encourage or discourage marriage, although it does teach how one might live a happily married life.
Different religions have different beliefs regarding the breakup of marriage.
For example, the Roman Catholic Church does not recognize divorce, because in its eyes, a marriage is forged by God. The Catholic Church recognizes marriages between non-baptized people as "good and natural marriages" and even if only one partner is baptized, does not permit them to divorce if the non-baptized person is willing to live peaceably with the Christian. However, if the non-baptized person refuses to live with the Christian, or to do so peaceably -- if, for instance, they interfere with the Christian's practice of religion -- the marriage can be broken. Catholicism teaches that both parties entering into a marriage must have the appropriate intentions: to remain married until death ends the marriage, to be faithful in marriage and to be open to the gift of children. With a nullity, religions and the state often apply different rules, meaning that a couple, for example, could receive an annulment from the state and not have their marriage annulled by the Catholic Church because the state disagrees with the church over whether an annulment could be granted in a particular case. Scholars of the Qur'an suggest that the main point is to prevent any decisions by the woman from being affected by hormonal fluctuations as well as to allow any heated arguments or differences to be resolved in a civil manner before the marriage is completely terminated. The man is also obliged to give his wife a gift or monetary sum equivalent to at least half her mahr (gift or monetary sum which is given to the wife at the commencement of the marriage).
Marriages are typically entered into with a vow that explicitly limits the duration of the marriage with the statement "till death do you part". However, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) have a distinctive view of marriage called celestial marriage, wherein they believe that individuals that are worthy can enter into a marriage relationship that can endure beyond death.
Marriage and economics
The economics of marriage have changed over time.
Morning gifts were preserved for many centuries in morganatic marriage, a union where the wife's inferior social status was held to prohibit her children from inheriting a noble's titles or estates. In the latter case, called community property, when the marriage ends by divorce each owns half;
In some legal systems, the partners in a marriage are "jointly liable" for the debts of the marriage. Critics of this practice note that debt collection agencies can abuse this claiming an unreasonably wide range of debts to be expenses of the marriage.
The respective maintenance obligations, during and eventually after a marriage, are regulated in most jurisdictions;
Some have attempted to analyze the institution of marriage using economic theory; for example, anarcho-capitalist economist David Friedman has written a lengthy and controversial study of marriage as a market transaction (the market for husbands and wives) . Though an expected social norm in America, hypergyny is slowly being replaced by Isogamy, marriage between equals, and the marrying 'down' of woman.
Romantic marriage and pragmatic marriage
Romantic marriage
The so-called "romantic" marriage is usually initiated by the participants themselves after realizing that a cathexic bond exists between them or that making a commitment to live together, share a household, and possibly raise children is mutually advantageous.
Pragmatic marriage
A pragmatic (or 'arranged') marriage that is facilitated by formal procedures of family or group politics. In both cases, the authority has a compelling veto over the marriage, and this system is socially supported by the rest of community so that to deny it is extreme and drastic.
Arranged and 'pragmatic' marriages are typical of dowry-based inheritance systems. Women in these societies inherit male wealth at the time of marriage, causing the parents to have a particular interest in their daughters' marriages. Modern Western marriage expectations and traditions are derived from this system of dowry-based marriage.
Pragmatic marriage contrasted to romantic marriage
Cultures that aspire to create relationships after couples marry are those with institutionalized practices of pragmatic marriage. Cultures that come to think that marriages should only be tried once a short-term compatibility already exists adopt romantic marriages.
Those who believe in romantic marriage will often criticize pragmatic marriage, considering it is oppressive, inhuman, sexist, or immoral. Defenders of pragmatic marriage disagree, often pointing to cultures where the success rate of pragmatic marriages is seen to be high, and holding that nearly all couples learn to love and care for each other very deeply.
Those who uphold pragmatic marriage frequently state that it is traditional, that it upholds social morals, that it is good for the families involved.
The arranged marriage and the romantic marriage are not strict opposites.
Same-sex marriage
Introduction
Same-sex unions have been recorded in the history of a number of cultures, but marriages or socially-accepted unions between same-sex partners were rare or nonexistent in other cultures. Same-sex marriage remains infrequent worldwide, especially as it is prohibited in most countries. As tolerance of homosexuality has become more widespread in Western cultures, more governments are allowing and/or sanctioning marriage of same-sex couples.
Jurisdictions accepting same-sex marriage
Some countries recognize same-sex marriage, including the Netherlands, Belgium, Canada, and Spain. In the United States same-sex marriage is currently considered unprotected by the U.S. constitution, and is banned in the majority of states, either constitutionally or by statute. Pending legal challenges to marriage restrictions are aimed at expanding or reinforcing the recognition of same-sex marriages to California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and Washington .
Likewise, pending legal and electoral challenges to recognition of same-sex marriages and civil unions are aimed at prohibiting such recognition in states such as Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Idaho, Indiana, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin .
Controversy
These developments have created a political and religious backlash, most notably in the United Kingdom, where the Church of England has, after long debate, officially banned blessings of gay couples, and in the United States, where several states have specifically outlawed same-sex marriage, often by popular referenda. The state of Mississippi passed a ban on same sex marriage with 86% of the vote, the highest percentage seen on a statewide level.
The city of San Francisco in 2004 began sanctioning same-sex marriages despite their being explicitly illegal in California. (See Same-sex marriage in California for more information.)
Criticisms of the institution of marriage
Some commentators have been critical of marriage, sometimes condemning individual local practices and sometimes even the entire institution.
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