Sex and Marriage - Lecture Flashcards
Sexuality is socially___and___
- regulated
- controlled
How are sexuality and procreation seen in Trobrianders society?
Seen as linked (sexuality is praised)
How is sexuality and procreation viewed in Middle East cultures?
Seen as incompatible (chastity is praised)
True or False: homosexuality is culturally accepted in many cultures.
True
What are some examples of homosexuality being culturally regulated?
Berdache, or double spiritedness, North American aboriginal cultures.
How’s homosexuality culturally constructed, two examples?
- Etero of New Guinea: encourages male sex amongst young males
- Chinese sisterhood of Guangdong, 19 cent.
What are the Otaku of Japan an example of?
Asexuality
What percent of the population claim to be asexual?
1%
What does marriage control?
Controls sexual relations
What sanctions regular sexual access to social approved partner(s)?
Marriage
What are the Nayar of southwest India an example of?
Marriage sanctioning sexual access
True or False: In most of the world, marriage is based on romantic love, not economic considerations.
false
Why did monogamy gradually become the most common form of marriage?
Primarily for economic reasons
What is customs, rules, and obligations that establish a special relationship between sexually cohabiting adults, whether of different or the same sex.
Marriage
___does not automatically stem from the biological category of sex.
Gender (being man or a woman)
What are two examples of gender not automatically stemming from the biological category of sex?
- Nandi of Kenya
- Berdache people
What are the 3 main functions of marriage?
1) the need to regulate sexual access
2) the way to arrange for the products and services of men and women to be exchanged and for the care of children
3) extends alliances blinking different families and kin groups together (royal families and marriage patterns)
What is the incest taboo?
Prohibition of sexual relations between parents and children, and between siblings.
What are 4 theories for the incest taboo?
- humanist explanation (19th century)
- genetic explanation (19th century)
- instinct explanation
- social harmony explanations:
- social functional (Malinowski)
- psychological (Freud)
What is endogamy?
Marriage within a group of individuals (marrying within the caste, racial community, social class, etc.)
What is exogamy?
Marriage outside the group
What is the theory that explains exogamy?
alliance theory (Levi-Strauss 1949-69)
What are cross cousins?
Are the children on one’s parents’ siblings of the opposite sex (mother’s brother or father’s sister)
True or false: cross cousin marriage has been preferential in many societies (under the premise of exogamy).
True
What marriage is common among ancient Greeks, Israelites, traditional China?
Patrilateral c.c.m
What type of marriage is common among australian aborigines, haida (prince charlotte islands)
matrilateral c.c.m
What are parallel cousins?
Are the children of the parents’ same sex siblings (mother’s sister, or father’s brother)
What type of marriage has been practiced among some Muslim Arabs of North Africa (marrying father’s brother child)
patrilateral parallel cousin marriage
What is levirate?
A man marries the widow of his dead brother
What is sororate?
A custom when a married woman dies, her kin group supplies a sister as a wife for the widower.
What is the purpose of levirate and sororate?
Attest to the importance of marriages as an alliance between the groups rather than between the individuals
What type of preferential marriage rule is practiced among the Nuer people of Africa?
Levirate
What are the 3 types of number of spouses?
1) Monogamy (today, serial monogamy)
2) polygamy
3) group marriage
What are the two types of polygamy? Describe.
Polygyny: a rule permitting a man to have more than one wife
Polyandry: a rule permitting a woman to have more than one husband
In a sample of 554 societies:
polygyny was favoured in___
monogamy in___
polyandry in___
- 415
- 135
- 4
Where is polygyny found usually?
Found most characteristically in horticultural societies.
Why is polygyny common?
Increases a man’s wealth and social position in societies where economic importance of women’s labour is high
What is combined with polygyny?
Patriarchal authority is combined with high degree of woman’s sexual and economic freedom.
What is sororal polygyny?
A man marries sisters
Where is polyandry found?
Found in some parts of Tibet, Nepal, and among the Today in Pahari Hindus of India.
What is the cause for polyandry/
Adaptation to a shortage of female (at times create by female infanticide, Today, Tibetans); or shortage of land (Tibet).
What is fraternal polyandry?
A Toda female (South India) marries one male and becomes wife to his brothers.
True or False: today, the Todas are largely monogamous.
True
What are three kinds of marriage exchanges of rights and goods?
- bride-price
- bride service
- dowry
What is bride-price?
payment of many from the groom’s to the bride’s kin to legitimize marriage
What does bride-price recognize?
economic importance of woman’s labour
Where is bride price found especially?
in cultures of Africa, among pastoralist, like Nuer.
What is bride service?
The groom is expected to work for a period for the brides family.
How do the Ju/’hoansi practice bride service?
Man may work for15 years, or until a third child is born.
What is dowry?
Payment of a woman’s inheritance at the time of marriage to her or her husband
Whereis dowry commonly practiced?
India, Savic cultures of Eastern Europe others.
What is a social/cultural tool to deal with problems?
marriage
What are two important functions of marriage?
- regulate sexual access
- bind people to their offspring
True or False: Historically marriage was always based on love.
False
Describe how sexual relations are perceived in the Trobriander society?
- build sexuality from early age on
- experimentation encouraged
- after, they will settle 1 person
- freedom allows youth to be prepared for social tensions that affect adults. Idea o navigating difficult social relations
- marry at about age 17
What percent of cultures (of 76 studied around the world in 1951) viewed homosexual male behaviour was tolerated and seen as normal
64%
What do we construct gender around?
Our sexual identities
Are sex identities the same as gender identities?
no
What do the Etero of New Guinea think about male insemination?
Young men will grow stronger is the liaison with males. Harmful for young men to engage in sexual relations with young women.
It is more productive to study why people___in homosexual behaviour as opposed to___people.
- engage
- labelling
What is asexual ?
no sex drive
Describe rules of sexual access in the Nayar society?
- There are 2 transactions regulating sexual access
- Female sexual relations with approved men
- Allowed to participate in sexual relations until 1st marriage (3-4 days long). After she can engage unisexual relations with different men until she becomes pregnant. Man will bring gifts to household –> becomes her second husband. Final marriage understood among Nayar once he brings gifs to recognize paternity. But, children belong to female’s household and are raised by her and her father and brothers.
What are Berdache people?
two spiritedness
What are the Nandi and they marriage customs?
- pastoralists
- men are focused on raising cattle, indicates wealth
- polygamy because they need labour power.
- women reside in individual small huts with children and given small amounts of cattle to look over
- sons are economic insurance in these societies.
What happens if a woman doesn’t have a son in Nandi societies?
If you don’t have a son, a woman can choose to marry another woman, young woman will have children. So that the sons can inherit th cattle. These unions between 2 women create opportunities for people who do not fit into standard roles ins society. Status is elevated beyond that of a normal woman in their society.
What is the fundamental social reasons for marriage?
marriage is an important tool to build relationship with other families.
What two preferential rules are important for political balance in a society?
Levirate and Sororate
What percent of people in Canadian societies are divorced?
~50%
Even as polyandry decreases, the cultural___remains.
memory
What 3 exchanges of rights and goods at marriage maintain economic well-being of woman?
- bride price
- bride service
- dowry
