Remember when I tried to convince people that marriage was bad for the economy? (Which may not have been my most convincing argument ever, although I still think the topic deserves discussion) Well, this is a follow up.
I'm reading "Sex at Dawn" (yes, this is the kind of thing I do on vacation), which is basically a whole lot of theories about the evolution of human society. (Before you judge me, this book came highly recommended by Dan Savage, which should probably have been a warning to me that it wasn't going to contain the strongest science ever but...)
The authors present an interesting theory, which they actually borrow from Jared Diamond (of "Guns, Germs, Steel" fame). Basically, they say that the idea of marriage really only came into existence when humans shifted from foraging to agricultural societies, at the same time that people adopted the concept of individually owned property. (Basically, marriage was invented because paternity became important because people had to pass land down through the generations.)
This argument would probably appeal to a lot of people nowadays who seem turned off by the idea of inheritable property (I'm thinking of the crowd that's currently occupying Wall Street, several of whom I'm pretty sure were on my bus to New York this past weekend - woman with a bag of "organic flatbreads", I'm looking at you).
It IS true that Indian agricultural societies seem to be the most rigidly paternalistic I've ever come across, but that could be coincidence/a host of other factors. (And yet, as one World Bank researcher suggested to me recently, we really overemphasize the role of "social factors" in these analyses) I do remember that when I was 17, I spent a summer working in various rural Indian villages. These were the kinds of places so remote that you could only reach them by bullock cart or motorcycle, and the people who lived there spoke tribal dialects of Hindi (in a Hindi speaking state) and had never heard of electricity. Although women played an important role in some of these villages, there were plenty of others where the forces that acted against women seemed almost deliberately extreme, in a way I still don't understand (for example, I'd rather look at the rigid Hindu strictures against widows, as well as the concept of "honor killing" to punish those who marry outside a community, as debates over property, because otherwise I'd have to think that people are willfully and en masse sadistic). It was also interesting that I, despite being only 17, was invited into meetings of tribal elders where I was the only woman in a roomful of men who were in their 50s and 60s. They had no issue admitting that I had the right to sit with them, but would never have allowed their wives or daughters the same privilege.
ANYWAY.
For various personal reasons, I find the whole "agricultural" argument about marriage really attractive because it suggests that the current way of doing things - which has observable flaws - isn't the only way. But even I have to admit that the "support" in evidence of the "agricultural" theory isn't really all that scientific.
Here's what IS interesting, and maybe more worth mentioning by way of support: when I was in high school, we read Francis Fukuyama's "End of History." At the time, we tore Fukuyama apart for his naive belief that capitalist democracy was the end-all social goal of human civilization. (Again, recent years have demonstrated that democracy, at least, isn't the answer to all of mankind's government problems).
Here's the thing. We have no trouble admitting that both capitalism and democracy are in a state of flux, and that in the future very different systems might emerge. But for some reason, we still hang onto the belief that the way we understand family structure and relationships is the result of some inevitable and deep-seated urge in the human psyche. Why? Why should the human spirit crave monogamous marriage anymore than it craves life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?
(By the way, I'm not saying any of this because I hate marriage. In fact, the reverse. But marriage as an institution is evolving, as is the way we organize responsibilities and roles within families. And I think evolution is a natural, healthy and necessary thing for institutions as well as species.)
I'm reading "Sex at Dawn" (yes, this is the kind of thing I do on vacation), which is basically a whole lot of theories about the evolution of human society. (Before you judge me, this book came highly recommended by Dan Savage, which should probably have been a warning to me that it wasn't going to contain the strongest science ever but...)
The authors present an interesting theory, which they actually borrow from Jared Diamond (of "Guns, Germs, Steel" fame). Basically, they say that the idea of marriage really only came into existence when humans shifted from foraging to agricultural societies, at the same time that people adopted the concept of individually owned property. (Basically, marriage was invented because paternity became important because people had to pass land down through the generations.)
This argument would probably appeal to a lot of people nowadays who seem turned off by the idea of inheritable property (I'm thinking of the crowd that's currently occupying Wall Street, several of whom I'm pretty sure were on my bus to New York this past weekend - woman with a bag of "organic flatbreads", I'm looking at you).
It IS true that Indian agricultural societies seem to be the most rigidly paternalistic I've ever come across, but that could be coincidence/a host of other factors. (And yet, as one World Bank researcher suggested to me recently, we really overemphasize the role of "social factors" in these analyses) I do remember that when I was 17, I spent a summer working in various rural Indian villages. These were the kinds of places so remote that you could only reach them by bullock cart or motorcycle, and the people who lived there spoke tribal dialects of Hindi (in a Hindi speaking state) and had never heard of electricity. Although women played an important role in some of these villages, there were plenty of others where the forces that acted against women seemed almost deliberately extreme, in a way I still don't understand (for example, I'd rather look at the rigid Hindu strictures against widows, as well as the concept of "honor killing" to punish those who marry outside a community, as debates over property, because otherwise I'd have to think that people are willfully and en masse sadistic). It was also interesting that I, despite being only 17, was invited into meetings of tribal elders where I was the only woman in a roomful of men who were in their 50s and 60s. They had no issue admitting that I had the right to sit with them, but would never have allowed their wives or daughters the same privilege.
ANYWAY.
For various personal reasons, I find the whole "agricultural" argument about marriage really attractive because it suggests that the current way of doing things - which has observable flaws - isn't the only way. But even I have to admit that the "support" in evidence of the "agricultural" theory isn't really all that scientific.
Here's what IS interesting, and maybe more worth mentioning by way of support: when I was in high school, we read Francis Fukuyama's "End of History." At the time, we tore Fukuyama apart for his naive belief that capitalist democracy was the end-all social goal of human civilization. (Again, recent years have demonstrated that democracy, at least, isn't the answer to all of mankind's government problems).
Here's the thing. We have no trouble admitting that both capitalism and democracy are in a state of flux, and that in the future very different systems might emerge. But for some reason, we still hang onto the belief that the way we understand family structure and relationships is the result of some inevitable and deep-seated urge in the human psyche. Why? Why should the human spirit crave monogamous marriage anymore than it craves life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?
(By the way, I'm not saying any of this because I hate marriage. In fact, the reverse. But marriage as an institution is evolving, as is the way we organize responsibilities and roles within families. And I think evolution is a natural, healthy and necessary thing for institutions as well as species.)
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