The Arranged Marriage or Love Marriage - Research Paper Example

?The Arranged Marriage or Love Marriage HyungJin Kim Case Western Reserve The Arranged Marriage or Love Marriage Introduction The institution of marriage (Applbaum, 1995) can be traced from antiquity. Some of the ancient societies required proper and well-coordinated marriage. These societies wanted a secure environment that would perpetuate the species’ well being. Most of the marriages were conducted under a system rules that involved the right of passing properties and protecting the family bloodline and lineage. Marriage provided a solution to all the lineage and bloodline issues (Applbaum, 1995). For instance, the ancient Hebrew law required or made it mandatory for a brother to marry or inherit the wife of the deceased brother. Marriage is currently found in all societies with each society having its own form and nature of marriage. The commonly known types of marriages include the monogamy, polygamy, polygyny, polyandry, exogamy, and endogamy (Coontz, 2006). These types of marriages can be constituted out of love or through arrangements with the family members of the parties getting married. Notably, there have been different types of marriages; however, this paper aims at addressing arranged and love marriages. Love and arranged marriages can take other forms including polygamy which is a form of marriage where a man marries more than one woman or a woman getting married to more than one man. However, in 1862, Abraham Lincoln made polygamy a criminal offence in the United States as well as persons who were in such relationships were innumerable (Batabyal and Beladi, 2002). Nonetheless, there was a belief that an individual must have had more than one partner so they could go to heaven. Polygyny is a marriage with more than one partner at the same time and polyandry is a woman who (Applbaum, 1995) marries more than one man at the same time (Gupta, 1976). Endogamy is marriage to several wives or husbands from the same family, community, tribe, or social group. Since the advent of marriage, marriage scenarios have immensely changed across different cultures and societies across the world. Women have since been given equal marriage right has men. During the medieval period, women were faced full responsibility of their marriages and religion. On numerous occasions, marriages have been significantly pegged on other several reasons other than love. In some cases, economic liaison was taken to be the main reason behind marriages. In most cases, there were dowry as well as proxy marriages. In the case of dowry marriages, bride and his family are expected to pay dowry to the family of the groom. The dowry may be in the form of money or present (Applbaum, 1995). However, there some cultures that requires the groom’s family to pay dowry to the bride. Significantly, few marriages in the world require any sort of courtship or dating. Despite differences in nature and types of marriages, the culture of engagement ring is a universal customary in marriage. The use of engagement ring can be traced back from the ancient Roman. There was a belief that the roundness of the ring represented the concept of an eternal relationship (Gupta, 1976). Additionally, there is a belief that the ring and the adorn finger ring directly connects the nerves and the heart. Marriage is considered a secret bond, as opposed to physical connectivity (Allendorf and Ghimire, 2012). Notably, Saint Paul once compared the marriage relationship to the relationship between Christ and the Church. Arranged marriage This marriage can be traced from the aristocratic and royal families all over the world. Currently, arranged marriages are largely practiced in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Africa, and south Asia (Cherlin, 2004). In the south Asia, arranged marriages are common in nations including India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Pakistan. Moreover, the practise is also found between the Hasidic Judaism and the Unification Church. Arranged marriage should never be confused with the forced marriage (Gupta, 1976). Arranged marriages are often witnessed in traditional European, Indian, and African cultures particularly among the royalties. The older family members or the parents often decide upon the arranged marriage. The partner (bride and or groom) are ever decided for by the matchmaking agent, parents, trusted third parties, or matrimonial sites. Many communities often use religious leaders or priests as well as family friends and relatives are usually significant figures in the matchmaking role (Applbaum, 1995). The arranged marriages often vary in both nature and duration of time taken from introducing the couples to the rime of engagement. At the introduction stages, the parents may introduce their daughter or son to the potential spouse (Batabyal and Beladi, 2002). From the introduction, the remaining task of managing the relationship is left for the children. The maturity of the engagement is never timed. This form of arranged marriage is usually common in South America and particularly in Pakistan and India (Allendorf and Ghimire, 2012). Some of the practise is also common in Japan and in Iran where it is referred to khastegari. The open-ended arranged marriage usually takes considerably more courage on the prospective spouses, and their parents compared to fix time arranged marriages. Matchmaking Factors Different religions and cultural practices are usually considered before the potential spouses are engaged. Therefore, different cultural set ups have different factor in play before they find and decide on the mates (Allendorf and Ghimire, 2012). For instance, Indians have their own factors to consider that are also ranked according to priority. Spirituals and religious beliefs usually play a significant role in finding a suitable spouse (Gupta, 1976). However, some communities value the significance of culture and caste. The caste and cultures are primarily valued since they define ancestry of the family and individual’s tradition and culture. In most cases, prospective spouses are supposed to have common family religious and cultural believes and should be of the same language and share same food habits. Additionally, families often value the reputation of the family from which their son gets a woman. The same also applies to the family of the girl. Sometimes wealth plays a vital role. For instance, wealth families sometimes only need to marry from same wealthy families (Farr, 2011). Some families value vocation where grooms with professions including accountant, engineers, doctors, or lawyers are traditionally considered excellent spouse materials. Currently, some other professions that fetch relatively high income are also given preference. Vocation may be less beneficial to the bride, but it is rare for two people with the same vocation to be matched. However, the most preferred vocation of the pride includes doctor, teacher, or lawyer (Batabyal and Beladi, 2002). Most of the matchmakings often consider the physical fitness of an individual. The physically fit persons are like and quickly matched unlike those persons who might be considered weak and sickly. All other factors withstanding, the Indians often use horoscope to match spouses. In this case, they often apply numerology as well as the position of stars at the individual’s birth time (Allendorf and Ghimire, 2012). The Indian culture predicts the success of a particular match on the horoscope where the horoscope is the determining the factor whether an individual’s partner is a mangalik. The spouse link by this type of horoscope is likely to be negatively influenced by mars. Clan Links Clan links also differ accordingly as per a given culture and religion. For instance, most Nepalese and Indian Hindus, the caste hereditary system is an intensely vital factor in the arranged marriage (Allendorf and Ghimire, 2012). For the arranged marriages, the parents from both sides often requirethat the marrying partners to be within the same caste. In most cases, inter-caste marriages often lead to familial rejection and anger to marriage. Most of these have been confirmed in Indian websites (Ghimire, Axinn, Yabiku, and Thornton, 2006). Nonetheless, even within the caste numerous obligations need to be fulfilled. Most communities do follow caste regulations; however, the modern Indian society does allow inter caste marriage. The arranged marriages are less practiced in the Hindu Diaspora outside the south Asia (Allendorf and Ghimire, 2012), but the Indian immigrants to United Kingdom have taken the practice to some parts of this country and continent. Clan based arranged marriages are also common in some communities in Mexico and Amerindians especially among the Triqui including US immigrants. The Fundamentalist Latter Day Saint (FLDS) groups (should not be confused for LDS Church (Mormons) of the United States, also practice the arranged marriages under their FLDS religious affiliation. Additionally, the arranged marriages are common within the Muslim world especially in Pakistan where PaitLikkhi rituals are conducted during marriages that are clan affiliation base. Love Marriage This type of marriage is the union of two people based on mutual love, attraction, affection, and commitment. The application of the term love-marriage is highly insignificant in the western world since almost all marriages are based on love (Applbaum, 1995). The term only finds itsmeaning in areas where there are different concepts of marriages including forced marriage and arranged marriages. The term is commonly used in Middle Eastern and south Asian countries wherestrong traditions of arranged marriage systems persist. Depending on some cultural beliefs, love marriages may be neglected. Research Findings The interviews indicated that different people have different perceptions of these types of marriages. Some of the interviewed persons strongly feel that the arranged marriages are the best type of marriages while other has the exact opposite views. In counter arguments, it may be concluded that arranged marriage is the most preferred type of marriage among the two (Allendorf and Ghimire, 2012). According to those that support arranges marriages, they argue that the few years of introduction, the spouses spend more time knowing each other better than in love marriage that people only think that are based on affection. These couples spend more time with each other than in other cases. Pro Arranged marriage Views In the love marriage, couples are viewed to be spending difficult levels of understanding especially before marriage. The main understanding herein is that love marriage has some difficulties in social obligations that are expected on a marriage life (Arango, 2012). According to the arranged married people, the love-married couples are unlikely to adjust unlike the arranged married people since love marriage may sometimes be taken for granted. Moreover, the partners have no experience of the other since they had never met; thus, they do not know each other’s needs. Additionally, arranged marriages are good and faster avenues of solving domestic problems since the partners do not have a sense of fear to the partner. For the reason that might make the arranged marriage impossible, many people will readily support it to its success (Ladly, 2012). In the case of the love-married couples, one partner will be left at home thereby being compelled to take the problem as an individual. Pro Love Marriages According to the pro-love marriages, time is currently limited for people to engage in the arranged marriage processes that need more time to understand each other. Additionally, they insist that arranged marriages often work on compromises, but love marriage has little compromise since the first instance all is pegged on mutual love between the involved parties (Sim and Mackie, 2002). Some of them insisted that, at times, the social obligation embedded in the arranged marriage might be compromised or frustrated. The other advantage of love marriage is that they teach the couples the sense of becoming independent since most of the time these couples are separated thereby they are always tackling their individual problems. The love-married couples have a high comfort levels that are generated from their first encounter (Ladly, 2012). The parent of the love married couples often expect less from either families since most of the marriage arrangements and decisions are made by the couples without the involvement of the entire family members. These are the views of the Indian families where some of them are in arranged marriages while others are in love marriages. Despite India being embedded into its traditions, the global dynamics are somewhat imposing changes in the norm and the way it runs its affairs (Arango, 2012). In arranged marriages, the elderly often propose marriage that usually goes through horoscopes, educational qualification, biology, chemistry, physical, family background and history among other traditions and cultures that must be acceptable to both families (Allendorf and Ghimire, 2012). However, in most cases, acceptance from the girl’s family is never a priority. However, this understanding has started changing. Some children or couples are ever forced to marry according to the will of the elders or parents. In this sense, most of them often scarify their happiness for the sake of their parent’s happiness. From the research, it is apparent that the feelings and love often grow gradually in the arranged marriage. As time elapses, the relationship and the love get stronger. In the case of love marriage, the marriage is based on attraction that is based on the passionate feeling of one couple to another. This feeling diminishes with time (Batabyal and Beladi, 2002). In fact, in India, most arranged married couples tend to remain in their marriages life compared to the love married couples. After the tenth year of marriage, it is found that the love between the arranged married couples is twice strong than that of the love married couples. The main problem identified with love marriages is that they are pegged on love that is misunderstood perennially and is influenced by unrealistic media portrayals. Therefore, the most appropriate way to get a long lasting love is through arranged marriage (Gupta, 1976). Relationships are organic; therefore, it can be fused into deep commitment that results into everlasting love that can be empowered through types of marriages. Notably, even those who pretend that they are in love may find themselves into deep relationship (Lee and Ono, 2008). Some elaborative studies have indicated that most of the love marriages have led to numerous divorce marriages and single parents. Since in arranged marriages, couples want to maintain the dignity of their parents and that of their families, most of the time they intend to remain in their marriages despite the challenges. Thus, the arranged marriages often thrive in the mist challenges (Batabyal and Beladi, 2002). Additionally, the arranged marriages often receive moral support from different quarters; therefore, the couples ever remain positive to each other regardless the situations they are facing. Practically, comparing marriages in the United States and Israel, it is apparent that there are low rates of divorce among the Jewish than among the Americans. The Jewish marriages are mainly arranged marriages while the Americans are purely love-marriages. Despite the underlying advantages of the arranged marriage over love marriages, it is not always the most successful form of marriage. Arranged marriages often receive support from different corners including emotional support thereby keeping the relationship the responsibility of different people. Unlike the arranged marriage, parties other than the couples less support the love marriage. The lack of these supports makes it vulnerable to even slightest challenge. It is worth noting that under arranged marriages, the bride is often protected as she remains under the care of the parents according to their wish. Regardless of the limitation of the love marriage, everyone is given an opportunity to express his or her own individual care and responsibilities. Additionally, love marriage allows the partners to understand each other well before they decide on the next step. Despite the advantages and disadvantages of these marriages types, the success of each marriage will only be pegged on each couple’s effort towards the success of the marriage since marriage is an institution that needs proper management. 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