MARRIAGE AND VARIATIONS PRACTICES

What is Marriage? Marriage is a complex aspect of the family and kinship. Marriage involves the alliance between two kin groups, so that when one enters into such a state, he does not only marry a person of the opposite sex but all her relatives as well. It is an important institutional element of the family and provides the cultural mechanism to ensure its continuity. It involves a set of ideal patterns and norms, values, beliefs and, in advanced societies, formal rules or contracts, and an emotional state called love.

Norms in Preferential Mating ENDOGAMY. Endogamy prescribes that one should marry within ones clan, social class, religion, or ethnic group EXOGAMY. Exogamy prescribes that one should marry outside of his own group, whether that group is the family, clan, village, or some other social unit. PARALLEL COUSIN MARRIAGE. Ones parallel cousin is the child of the sibling of parents of the same sex, that is fathers brothers or mothers sister. CROSS-COUSIN MARRIAGE. Cross cousins are cousins related through the parents of the opposite sex, that is fathers sister or mothers brother. LEVIRATE. Levirate is the practice of requiring a widow to marry the brother or nearest kin of the deceased husband. SORORATE. In the Sororate, the widower is made to marry the sister of nearest kin of the deceased wife.

Means of Acquiring a Mate: Marriage Considerations

The Bride price or Bride Wealth The Bride price is a certain amount of money or valuable gift given by the groom or grooms parents to the parents of the girl. This is what is known bigay-kaya among ancient Filipinos.

Bride Service The bride service may be substituted for the bride price when the latter is very small or the prospective groom cannot afford to pay it. The prospective groom will work by special arrangement in the household of the brides family.

Dowry

The dowry is the amount of money, goods, or estate given by the brides fa mily to the groom or his family.

FORMS OF MARRIAGE Monogamy is the Marriage of one man to one woman at a time. Polygamy is plural marriage and may assume anyone of three forms: polygyny, polyandry, and group marriage Three forms of Polygamy 1. 2. 3. Polygyny- is the marriage of a man to two or more women at the same time. Polyandry- is the marriage of one woman to two or more men at the same time. Group marriage- the union of a group of men to a group of women at the same time.