The four case studies below were designed as a workshop in a research setting. They could also be used as a lesson plan for college students. The material is divided into four case studies. One can use any of the case studies independently. One can change the order in which the case studies are used. If you want to share with me how you plan to use these case studies, communicate to me at [email protected] • Case 1: Does the Bible (...) require that marriage be limited to one man and one woman? • Case 2: Matthew Vines, a fervent believer wrestling with loneliness • Case 3: Does the Bible support the contention that marriage rules never change? • Case 4: The Emergence and Disappearance of Levirate Marriages . (shrink)

This anthology contextualizes key feminist texts and ideas by linking them with the transformation of public opinion brought about by the late Victorian debate on marriage, motherhood and women's right to an independent life. Included are Mona Caird's controversial The Morality of Marriage ; debates between feminists, traditionalists and anti-feminists on marriage, divorce and the New Woman, and selected reading from New Woman fiction, both feminist and anti-feminist, which reproduces the media debate on morality in (...) literature. (shrink)

Based on a wide range of Latin and vernacular sources, this essay reexamines Thomas Laqueur’s and Londa Schiebinger’s influential claim that the idea of incommensurable anatomical difference between the sexes was “invented” in the eighteenth century, reflecting, in particular, a need to resort to nature in order to justify female subordination against new ideals of equality and universal rights. It provides ample evidence that already around 1600 many leading physicians, rather than proclaiming a “one‐sex model” of female inferiority, insisted on (...) the unique and purposeful features of the female skeleton and the female genital organs and illustrated them visually. The author shares Laqueur’s and Schiebinger’s assumption that the shift toward incommensurable anatomical difference helped legitimize woman’s subordinate position as housewife and mother as naturally given. But around 1600 Enlightenment ideals as yet played no role. Instead, this shift reflected, in particular, contemporary physicians’ growing appreciation of personal discovery and innovation, the rise of a specialist gynecology, and new views on marriage and motherhood in the upper classes among whom the physicians lived and whose support they sought. (shrink)

The overall aim of this article is to explore the analytical potential and normative value of Helga M. Hernes' concept about woman-friendly welfare states in analysis of Scandinavian countries. The first part discusses the underlying theoretical, political and normative assumptions about gender equality and social justice related to dimensions such as redistribution, recognition and representation. The second part addresses the analytical potential of the concepts for understanding gender equality developments in Scandinavia. The focus is on three themes related to (...) the desirability, feasibility, and theoretical strength of the Scandinavian welfare and gender equality model and the underlying normative, empirical and theoretical premises. The analysis deals with debates about the public—private split in relation to woman-friendly policies, focusing on parental leave, childcare, and age restrictions in marriages involving foreigners. State feminism is explored in relation to women's political participation and representation and women's ability to influence gender equality policies. Furthermore, national variations in views about state feminism are identified. Finally, the article addresses the role of woman-friendly policies in debates about responses of Western welfare states to globalization, ageing and multiculturalism. (shrink)

In an anecdote in the Holy Bible, there is a rumor that because the Prophet David wanted to marry a woman named Bathsheba, whom he saw, he commissioned her soldier husband Uriah the Hittite to cause him to die in the most critical places of the army. In Islamic sources, some narrations originating from Isrāʾīliyyāt have been conveyed in many different ways. Likewise, in some Islamic sources, this incident, which is attributed to the Prophet David, was unfortunately also linked (...) to the marriage of the Prophet Muḥammad and Zaynab b. Jaḥsh. In addition, there is a claim that the Prophet Muḥammad sent Zayd b. Ḥāritha, who was Zaynab b. Jaḥsh’s ex-husband, to many wars and eventually caused his death in Muʾta war. First, the so-called incident between Prophet David and Uriah the Hittite will be discussed, and thereafter, Prophet Muḥammad and Zaynab b. Jaḥsh’s marriage will be thoroughly addressed in the study. In addition, it will be revealed that the incident that was attributed to the Prophet David was in no way similar to the incident of assigning Zayd b. Ḥāritha as a commander.Summary: According to a parable in the Bible, Prophet David sees a woman bathing while he was walking around the roof of his palace one night and he is impressed by her. Prophet David sends someone to investigate who this woman is, and as a result of the research, it is revealed that this woman is Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah the Hittite, one of the commanders of Prophet David. Prophet David sends someone to bring this woman and when the woman is brought to him, he commits adultery with her. The woman becomes pregnant after this affair and informs Prophet David about this situation. After receiving this news of pregnancy, Prophet David sends a message to the commander-in-chief, Joab, who is at war with his army, and asks him to send Uriah the Hittite to him. After hosting Uriah the Hittite in the palace for a few days, Prophet David sends him back to the front with a letter to be given to the commander-in-chief, Joab. In this letter, Prophet David asks the commander-in-chief, Joab, to send Uriah the Hittite to the most dangerous place in the war and to ensure that he is killed. Fulfilling the order stated in the letter of Prophet Davud, Joab sends Uriah the Hittite to a region where the war will be the harshest and causes him to be killed there. After the mourning of Bathsheba for her husband ends, Prophet David marries her. According to the Islamic belief, it is not possible for this incident to occur as it was mentioned in the Bible since the prophets were protected by Allah. It is because the parable states Prophet David committed adultery. In the Qur’ān, which is the source where we can get the clearest information about the incident, it is narrated inverses 21-25 of sûra Ṣād. Although there is a partial resemblance between the verses and the Bible, the verses do not mention either the woman or Prophet David’s sending that woman’s husband to the war because he wanted to marry her.In other Islamic sources, some relevant narrations originating in Isrāʾīliyyāt are narrated in many different ways. Our tafsīr scholars did not approve these narrations originating in Isrāʾīliyyāt. Also, they stated that the narrations expressing that Prophet David sent Uriah the Hittite to the war for his killing were not true and that such a situation would not be suitable for a prophet or even for a Muslim.In the same sources, many different possibilities were voiced in order to resolve the situation and this incident, which was attributed to Prophet David, was tried to be placed on a more reasonable ground. As a result of these efforts, the marriage of the Prophet Muḥammad and Zaynab b. Jaḥsh has been linked to this incident in various ways.Although it is not possible to give a certain date of the marriage of Zaynab and Zayd b. Ḥāritha, it is seen that this marriage occurred with the help of the Prophet Muḥammad in the first year of the emigration to Madinah. The marriage of the Prophet Muḥammad’s aunt’s daughter and Zayd, a freed slave, was for eliminating the discrimination between free individuals and slaves that existed in the society.There is not any serious problem about the marriage of Zayd and Zaynab at this point. However, at the point of ending this marriage, there are some narrations in our sources, and these leave the Prophet Muḥammad under suspicion. According to these narrations, the Prophet Muḥammad went to Zayd’s house to meet him and the Prophet Muḥammad called out to Zayd from outside the house. For not keeping the Prophet Muḥammad outside, Zaynab opened the door and invited the Prophet Muḥammad in by stating that Zayd was not at home although the clothes on her were not suitable. As soon as the Prophet Muḥammad saw her, he immediately turned his head and because he liked Zaynab, “I exonerate almighty Allah. I exonerate Allah that has turned the hearts.” he grumbled. After a while, Zayd came home and learned what the Prophet Muḥammad said. He immediately went to the Prophet Muḥammad and said “Messenger of Allah! May my mother and father be sacrificed for you. If you liked Zaynab, let me divorce her for you.” However, the Prophet Muḥammad advised him not to divorce his wife. As far as we can find in our sources, there are two other similar narrations.These narrations contain many problems in terms of both isnād and logical consistency. When we examine at the narrations in terms of isnād, we see that all three narrations are mursal. We can say that this is the first factor that reduces the reliability of narrations. Secondly, all narrations have at least one narrator accused of weakness or even dishonesty. Therefore, it is not appropriate to base a serious claim about the Prophet Muḥammad on such weak narrations. In addition, the rumor that the Prophet Muḥammad liked Zaynab, his aunt’s daughter and a married woman, and wished that she would divorce her husband has no reasonable logic. The fact that the marriage of Zayd and Zaynab ended quickly was mostly caused by Zaynab’s harsh temperament. Moreover, although Zaynab did not want this marriage, she could not oppose the order of the Prophet Muḥammad due to the verse about her. For these reasons, Zaynab could not get along with her husband and she was constantly reflecting her dissatisfaction with this marriage on Zayd. Therefore, Zayd constantly complained about Zaynab, but the Prophet Muḥammad gave Zayd the same advice every time, commanding “Keep your spouse with you, do not leave her!” Although the Prophet Muḥammad constantly banned Zayd, he could not stand Zaynab anymore and divorced her. After he divorced Zaynab, verse 37 of sûra al-Aḥzāb was sent down. Thus, the marriage of the Prophet Muḥammad and Zaynab took place as a result of a divine will.There is also a claim that the Prophet Muḥammad sent Zayd, the ex-husband of Zaynab, to many wars and consequently caused him to be killed in Muʾta war. When we examine the dates of the nine military expeditions, in which the Prophet Muḥammad appointed Zayd as a commander, it is seen that the first expedition was held on 3/624 while the others were held after 6/627. Therefore, at least eight of the nine expeditions in which Zayd served as a commander were taken place after the marriage of the Prophet Muḥammad and Zaynab. Consequently, in the light of this information, it is clear that the fact that Zayd was appointed as a commander is not similar to the situation in narrations about Prophet David. (shrink)

A woman's right to say no to a proposal of marriage, in defiance of her family and friends, was an essential feature of Victorian middle- and upper-class ideology, as it is represented in novels of the time. This right was based on the assumptions that falling in love is to some degree fortuitous, but that it is a permanent ontological change of selfhood. A good woman is justified in saying no even to an advantageous marriage proposal (...) if she does not love her suitor. Anthony Trollope's novels offer varied dramatizations of these assumptions, while Henry James's novels recount their incipient breakdown. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:On Thomas Aquinas’s Two Approaches to Female RationalityElisabeth Uffenheimer-LippensAlthough the female human being was never at the center of his daily and intellectual attention, Thomas Aquinas as a religious thinker had no choice but to consider her in a wide range of different contexts. She is found in theoretical-speculative discussions (about creation, original sin and its punishment, resurrection) and in more practical ones (about marriage, reproduction, ordination of (...) women, women as teachers, as witnesses). Thomas’s ideas about the female human being have been investigated by theologians, philosophers, and historians. Often, but not always, the research has been inspired and even distorted by one form or another of feminism.In this article I shall not discuss all the different aspects of the topic “woman” as they can be found in Thomas’s works, but limit myself to one of them, namely, his understanding of female rationality. I have become intrigued by the fact that he thought about the rationality of woman in two different ways which he never integrated or explicitly connected. In the majority of his texts Thomas describes woman’s rationality as “inferior” in comparison to the “superior” male rationality. This justifies her subordination to the male human being and is expressed in her inability to control her passions. There are, however, other texts in which Thomas discusses the human mind in general, without specifying whether he means the mind of the male or the female human being. He recognizes in the human mind two aspects or functions of rationality, namely, a ratio superior which he labels symbolically “masculine” and a ratio inferior which he calls “feminine.” The meaning of this is [End Page 191] that woman’s rationality is not of an inferior kind, but includes both aspects of rationality.The thesis underlying this article is that not enough attention has been paid to the fact that two fundamentally different ways of understanding female rationality can be found in the work of Thomas Aquinas. His symbolic use of male and female has too often been confused with what one could call the “real” relationship between man and woman. The aim of this article is to present these two different understandings in Thomas, without making any detailed attempt to trace their historical origins. In addition, I want to show the new perspectives that are opened up by his second approach.The first part of this article will focus on the “inferior rationality” of women and try to understand what is meant by inferiority. The discussion will develop around an analysis of the words mollis and mollities. This will lead me to the relationship between inferior rationality and bodily weakness on the one hand, and between inferior rationality and the passions on the other hand. The practical consequences of woman’s inferior rationality shall also be treated. The second part of this article will focus on the human mind, and on the difference between ratio inferior and ratio superior. The definition of these two functions of human rationality will be followed by an analysis of texts where Thomas describes original sin as a paradigm for concrete sin, and where he connects ratio inferior to woman/feminine and ratio superior to man/male. The discussion will be completed by a study of the relationship between the ratio inferior and the vis cogitativa. This will allow me to bring out the importance of this second understanding of female rationality.I. Woman’s Inferior RationalityWoman’s intellectual capacity is repeatedly described by Thomas with the unflattering comparatives debilior (debilis meaning, among other things, “disabled, infirm, feeble, frail, [End Page 192] weak”)1 and inferior. Almost every woman does not have a “firm judgment of reason”; she is “unstable of reason.”2 She does not possess “sufficient strength of mind” (to resist concupiscence).3 There is clearly a “deficiency of reason”4 because she has an overall “weakness of nature.”5These descriptions of female rationality can only be understood insofar as they stand over and against the male rationality which is described in almost bodily comparatives as fortior, firmior, robustior. The male has more “strength of soul.”6 In him “the discretion... (shrink)

The central thesis of Susan Okin's Justice, Gender, and the Family—that the ideology of the traditional family is the linchpin of contemporary gender inequality in the US—remains significant more than a quarter-century after the book's publication. On a political register, Okin's insistence on structural analysis of gender inequality is an important corrective to recent mainstream feminist emphasis on individual women's choices. On an academic register, her work reveals the incoherence of scholarly classifications of feminist theories as “liberal feminist” or “radical (...) feminist” by confounding such distinctions. I argue that her thesis is best understood in relation to the early radical feminism of Juliet Mitchell's Woman's Estate, a book Okin praised. Placing Okin's work in the context of its radical roots clarifies her “linchpin thesis,” but also reveals the limitations of her argument: in her emphasis on what Iris Young has termed the “distributive paradigm of justice,” Okin unnecessarily adopts a much narrower definition of the family than did Mitchell, and overestimates the influence of economic vulnerability after divorce on women's capacity to exit marriage. I suggest modifications to her theory, and conclude by showing the continuing relevance of her argument for analyzing recent legal, policy, and demographic shifts. (shrink)

Marriage, in fiction even more than in life, has been the woman's adventure, the object of her quest, her journey's end. Contemporary fiction modulates the formula in one respect: the abandonment of marriage replaces the achievement of it. While it is obvious what these fictional women detest in marriage, it is not always clear what they desire. How, indeed, might clarity be expected about an institution whose success depends so much upon woman's failure at autonomy? (...) So the women split: Kinflicks, Small Changes, The Women's Room, Loose Ends, The Oracle—these are merely representative of a long list. What is new in these books is that we are seeing marriage at all—seeing it, moreover, from a woman's point of view. "What about Norm?" the narrator asks in The Women's Room; "Who is he, this shadow man, this figurehead husband?"1 In fact, who Norm is, who all the husbands are, is clear: those who need someone to take care of their domestic, cooking, cleaning, sexual, breeding needs while they are out attending to civilization and their own appreciation of life. Even the least intelligent husbands realize that a change in marriage profound enough to satisfy the fleeing wives would profoundly alter the foundation of that conservative community, the family. Freud had urged women not to interfere with man in his pursuit of civilization; and this is the way it is, the way men want it to be. · 1. Marilyn French, The Women's Room , p. 193. Carolyn G. Heilbrun, professor of English at Columbia University, is the author of, among other works, Toward a Recognition of Androgyny. Her book, Reinventing Womanhood, includes parts of this present essay. (shrink)

This article investigates and provides guidelines to the negative impact of mahadi on the Basotho youth before they may marry. It is important to note that marriage is one of the main parts of the life cycle amongst the Basotho and not only joins a man and a woman together, but is also considered to unite the members of the respective families of the married couple into one family. This union of two families comes into effect when the (...) process of negotiation of the mahadi is initiated. The negotiation for mahadi is, in other words, the first stage of bonding two families together. In the hope of gaining a better understanding and results, the writer searched for a qualitative method to conduct the research. (shrink)

This book defends the conjugal view of marriage. Patrick Lee and Robert P. George argue that marriage is a distinctive type of community: the union of a man and a woman who have committed to sharing their lives on every level of their beings (bodily, emotionally, and spiritually) in the kind of union that would be fulfilled by conceiving and rearing children together. The comprehensive nature of this union, and its intrinsic orientation to procreation as its natural (...) fulfillment, distinguishes marriage from other types of community and provides the basis for the norms of marital exclusivity and permanence. Lee and George detail how the basic moral norms regarding sexual acts follow from the ethical requirement to respect the good of marriage and explain how the law should treat marriage, given its conjugal nature, examining both the same-sex-marriage issue and civil divorce. (shrink)

This article tries to understand the role of marriage in the religious lives of women during early Buddhism through the narrative of a relatively understudied text, Pāli Vimānavatthu. Marriage played a significant role in the lives of Buddhist laywomen as opposed to laymen since greater emphasis was placed on the third lay precept—prohibiting sexual misconduct—and the Buddhist ideology of patibbatā. However, complications arose when the ideal wives—in whose lives domesticity and family issues played an important role—were placed in (...) problematic marital situations. This article explores three such situations: the difficulties of marrying into a non-Buddhist family; the difficulties of being falsely accused of adultery; and the difficulties posed to merit-making by the state of pregnancy. In addition to all of the ordinary virtues that allowed a layperson to acquire merit, being an ideal wife and successfully resolving marital problems constituted a special category of merit-making virtue for Buddhist women. At the same time, whilst merit could be helpful to a woman in resolving marital difficulties, her commitment to Buddhism was finally meant to take precedence over any marital difficulties she might have. (shrink)

The main goal of this paper is to present the philosophical explanation of the marital relationship according to the Polish philosopher Karol Wojtyła. In our research, our attention was focused mainly on his book Love and Responsibility; the early philosophical work of a young, 37 year old Professor of Philosophy at the Catholic University in Lublin, Poland. In his writings, Karol Wojtyła—the future Pope John Paul II—presents marriage as a monogamous, indissoluble relationship between a man and a woman, (...) which grows out of mutual love for the purpose of procreation. Such a relationship is ruled by the „personalistic norm" which says that a person can never, under any circumstances, be a mere object of enjoyment for another person, but can only be the object of love. Love is a self-giving for the good of one's counterpart, so Marriage as a personalistic unity persists as long as these persons are alive. Because love is fecund from its very essence, so it is fruitful from its nature. Thus, procreation belongs to the principle ends of marriage. Such an attitude—as K. Wojtyła proves—is opposed to the utilitarian point of view of man and Marriage. According to the utilitarian conception, a person can be used as a means for achieving the highest good, i.e., pleasure. (shrink)

"Literature and the Right to Marriage," which bears the same title as the special issue that it introduces, takes up the challenge of the claim that marriage is a universal right. Framing the questions that traverse the five essays in the collection with a close reading of the sections on marriage from Hegel's Elements of the Philosophy of Right, the authors argue that if marriage can be considered a right, this right both guarantees access to and (...) is founded upon each partner's vow to abide by his or her vows to the other. Hegel's text is important because it underscores the linguistic dimension of the marriage ceremony; and it thus helps to show that, if the right to marriage were universal, it must be understood as the right to an irreplaceable kind of ritual speech. Moreover, this text is remarkably modern in its emphasis upon love as the condition of rightful marriage. Hegel considered the exchange of marriage vows to be a political event at which love becomes ethical , and ethics becomes political ; and thus also the point at which the model for "ethical love" becomes the verbally solemnized love between a man and a woman rather than the priestly love of the neighbor. Marriage, for Hegel, is always a turning point, both in the lives of the couple and in the history of the state. But this means that the importance of any marriage cannot be measured in terms of a norm; it can only be measured in terms of the amorous situation that precedes the event of marriage. Hegel's analyses are indispensable for grasping the stakes of the essays collected in this special issue and for addressing contemporary questions about which couples have the right to marry and what marriage becomes when those who would marry already have shared long and complex lives together. (shrink)

"Literature and the Right to Marriage," which bears the same title as the special issue that it introduces, takes up the challenge of the claim that marriage is a universal right. Framing the questions that traverse the five essays in the collection with a close reading of the sections on marriage from Hegel's Elements of the Philosophy of Right, the authors argue that if marriage can be considered a right, this right both guarantees access to and (...) is founded upon each partner's vow to abide by his or her vows to the other. Hegel's text is important because it underscores the linguistic dimension of the marriage ceremony; and it thus helps to show that, if the right to marriage were universal, it must be understood as the right to an irreplaceable kind of ritual speech. Moreover, this text is remarkably modern in its emphasis upon love as the condition of rightful marriage. Hegel considered the exchange of marriage vows to be a political event at which love becomes ethical (distinct from seduction), and ethics becomes political (distinct from morality and inseparable from civil society and the state); and thus also the point at which the model for "ethical love" becomes the verbally solemnized love between a man and a woman rather than the priestly love of the neighbor. Marriage, for Hegel, is always a turning point, both in the lives of the couple and in the history of the state. But this means that the importance of any marriage cannot be measured in terms of a norm; it can only be measured in terms of the amorous situation that precedes the event of marriage. Hegel's analyses are indispensable for grasping the stakes of the essays collected in this special issue and for addressing contemporary questions about which couples have the right to marry and what marriage becomes when those who would marry already have shared long and complex lives together. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:"A Woman's Thought Runs Before Her Actions":Vows as Speech Acts in As You Like ItWilliam O. ScottAbout a decade ago Susanne Wofford discussed As You Like It from the viewpoint that Rosalind uses a "proxy," her guise as Ganymede, in uttering "the performative language necessary to accomplish deeds such as marriage." 1 Thus Wofford complicated and qualified the success-oriented assumptions about performative usage of language as envisioned (...) in Austin's speech-act theories. 2 Her starting point was that (as Austin himself said) these performative usages don't have the same kind of force if they are included in a play; and so she proposed to take Rosalind's uses of vows as playful, both theatrically and personally. Her notion of the proxy, which raises questions too about the binding force of the speech act through the identity and tactics of the speaker, is especially apt in describing exactly what Rosalind does. Understandably Rosalind's performative manqué may be a prelude to the perfected form. Another complication suggests itself if one is going to attend to niceties of language usage: given that for Austin a performative procedure is founded on conventions of language, shouldn't one also examine such linguistic forms historically? For this play the most relevant form to consider historically is the vow.The precise formulation of vows, in espousal or marriage (both legally enforceable in church courts), was very important in early-modern England. One may wonder, then, what the formal requirements of [End Page 528] vows were, how much the analysis of them resembled and diverged from modern speech-act philosophy, and how the vows functioned. And one might ask such questions both about this play and about real-life practice. A more exact notion of vows may enrich our notions of Rosalind's playfulness with them and broaden our sense of the uses and tactics of performatives; and to the extent that this playfulness contrasts with Rosalind's serious (re)iteration of vows at the end of the play, we should give due weight to Carol Neely's suggestion that much of the pleasure for early-modern audiences lay in the body of the play rather than its conclusion. 3The actual vows between lovers would indeed lend themselves to historicized analysis of the speech acts that constitute them. The early-modern ecclesiastical court judge Henry Swinburne made something like that in his Treatise of Spousals, with his section "By what Form of Words Spousals de futuro are contracted," and similarly on the form of words in "Spousals de praesenti." 4 The implied time of effectiveness in the commitment to marriage is crucial in church law of the time, because it determines whether the vows are, respectively, a betrothal that promises a future marriage, or a present binding (whether inside or outside church) that becomes an instant marriage upon carnal consummation. Both these declarations of commitment are performatives (once reciprocated), and they are normally established by social convention, what Swinburne calls "the Common use of Speech or Custom" (p. 83). Swinburne also concerns himself with what amount to the conditions of "felicity" that are requisite to make the speech valid—for instance, who is allowed to contract spousals (cp. Austin, pp. 14–24).Both of these issues of timing and eligibility are important to Rosalind in the pretense of wedding in Act 4, Scene 1. As it is for Swinburne, the context is important: when Celia as priest asks, "Will you, Orlando, have to wife this Rosalind?" his answer "I will" is not good enough for Rosalind until he adds at her direction, "I take thee, Rosalind, for wife." 5 Likewise Swinburne considers at length the arguments whether there is a distinction between "I will" and "I do," and whether the future-sounding verb refers only to the beginning of a process and not its completion (pp. 8–9, 57–61). Though in general he allows the distinction (so that "I will" makes a spousal and "I do" a marriage), one of his exceptions sounds like the question that Celia first puts: "The Man demanding of the Woman whether she will take him to her Husband, she answereth [I will... (shrink)

In the title of the essay by the same name, James gives this answer to the question “What Makes a Life Significant:” “The solid meaning of life is always the same eternal thing—the marriage, namely, of some unhabitual ideal, however special, with some fidelity, courage, and endurance; with some man’s or woman’s pains.—And, whatever or wherever that life may be, there will always be the chance for that marriage to take place.”1 Significant lives, therefore, are comprised of (...) two married components: they are based on consciously chosen ideals, which are energetically pursued with a devoted discipline. James’ metaphor of “marriage” richly indicates the relationship between ideals and... (shrink)

The concubines, with whom the sultans lived a family life, were classified according to a certain hierarchy in the Harem. The first wives of the sultan and those who gave birth were called Kadınefendi. The other wives with a lower status than the Kadınefendi wives were called Ikbal Hanımefendi. According to Islamic law, marriage with a concubine is not like a marriage with a free woman. If a marriage is desired, the concubine must be freed. Until (...) the 19th century, sultans did not marry their concubines for a few exceptions. In the 19th century, the legal status of concubines in the Ottoman Empire became controversial. The countries of origine changed when the Ottoman Empire was unable to conquer new territory. Consequently, the enslavement procedure of prisoners of war disappeared. Instead, Caucasian immigrants, who had to leave their homeland mainly due to the Russian attacks, gave their daughters to the Ottoman palace so that they would not suffer misery and could reach important positions in the future. Among these were orphans from poor families as well as those from noble Caucasian dynasties. Even though the young women in the palace were called concubines, at least some of them were free/Muslim persons. This meant, that they could not be enslaved according to Islamic law. Although there was no problem for those who served in the palace, a remarkable situation emerged for the would-be spouses of the sultan. Could a woman from a free and Muslim family be the sultan's wife without a marriage bond? Was the limitation of the Kadınefendi numbers to four (in times of Sultan Abdülaziz) due to the Islamic law principle, that a man could marry maximum four wives? Was there a marriage ceremony (nikāh) for Kadınefendi wives? What was the situation of the Ikbal? Satisfactory answers to these questions have not been given yet. However, there are no official records it was claimed that lately sultans married especially their concubines who were Abkhaz descendants and included them among their wives in this way, because they were free and Muslims. Thus, the matter whether Sultan Abdülhamid II's wives were concubines or wedded became the subject of some research today. Memoires claim that almost all of Sultan Abdülhamid's wives were free and of Muslim origin. According to this, it was said that the wives of Sultan Abdülhamid could not have the status of the concubine and that their relationship should have been by marriage. On the other hand, considering that a maximum of four women can be married according to Islamic law, the marriage of the Sultan, who had thirteen wives, raised juristic questions. This problem was most clearly seen in the inheritance case filed by his heirs after the death of Sultan Abdülhamid. In this case, where it was claimed that Sultan Abdülhamid was married to nine wives, no objection was made to that claim. In this study, information about the wives of Sultan Abdülhamid and their legal status was tried to be determined through the documents related to their salaries during the 2nd Constitutional Era. Besides, the issue of nine wedded women, which emerged in the case of Sultan Abdülhamid's inheritance, was evaluated in terms of fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence). Sultan Abdülhamid was never accused of marriages contrary to Islamic law by his opponents during and after his reign. From this point of view, it can be said that there was no situation contrary to Islamic law regarding the Sultan's harem at that time. This might be due to three possibilities: Firstly, some wives have concealed the truth in the court, which is the weakest possibility according to the data obtained. Secondly, the talaq (divorcement) was hidden by Sultan Abdülhamid and his wives were not aware of it. This possibility has been found to be problematic when evaluated in terms of Hanafi fiqh. Thirdly, the practice of al-nikāh al-tanazzuhī (marriage performed in order to avoid from fornication). Considering the correspondence between the state departments in the period starting with the 2nd Constitutional Monarchy and until the Republic, it is clear that the Kadınefendis were regarded as married wives (their number was limited to four), while the Ikbals were regarded as concubines. From this point of view, it is thought that the most plausible possibility is that the Ikbals were regarded as concubines and their marriages were al-nikāh al-tanazzuhī. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:“Till Death Do Us Part”? Buddhist Insights on Christian MarriageWioleta PolinskaHigh divorce rates and declining marriage rates in Western societies draw the attention of many scholars to the fragility of contemporary marriages.1 Rampant individualism, permissive divorce law, and softening stance on divorce by mainstream Christian denominations are all listed as culprits responsible for the current marriage crisis.2 These conventional accounts, however, overlook important insights gathered by historians (...) of marriage, insights that point to a dramatic shift in the concept of marriage that occurred more than two hundred years ago. According to Stephanie Coontz, “the invention of the historically unprecedented idea that marriage should be based on love and mutual affection” 3 is responsible for greater fragility, but also for creating good, satisfying marriages that bring much happiness to people’s lives.4 Thus, the very source of fragility (the search for love and mutual affection) is also a source of deep connections and lasting relationships. While the fragility accompanying contemporary marriage is here to stay, our efforts to build strong unions need to be carefully evaluated. In what follows, I will address Christian and Buddhist approaches that aim at protecting the stability of marriage. To strengthen marriage, Christianity, from early on, focused on the permanence of marriage whether understood as a sacrament or, later on, as a covenant. Christian wedding vows that promise love, care, and enduring partnership “till death do us part” capture well the prevailing theology of Christian marriage. In contrast, Buddhism employs a concept of impermanence that implies an ever-changing reality that warrants no finality. Recent studies in psychology of mindfulness meditation show that such Buddhist concepts can translate well into effective skills for those in loving relationships. I will suggest that Christian theology might become more successful at preserving the stability of marriage by becoming less focused on the finality of couples’ bonds, and instead attending to the present reality of couples’ relationships.It is well documented that before the seventeenth century marriages were arranged by parents and fulfilled primarily political, economic, and social functions rather than individual needs. Marriage was seen as a means of enlarging one’s economic enterprise, acquiring powerful in-laws, strengthening military alliances, or (for the less [End Page 29] privileged) enlarging the family’s labor force.5 This is not to say that the notion of romantic love was unknown until the seventeenth century, but that it was not closely associated with marriage.6 In aristocratic courts of southern France, for example, romantic love appeared between an unmarried man and a married woman, and it should have been either unconsummated or adulterous.7 As late as the eighteenth century, a “sudden falling head over heels in love, although a familiar enough psychological phenomenon, was thought of as, a mild form of insanity” and an unreasonable basis for marriage.8 Romantic love became widely accepted only in the nineteenth century under the influence of Enlightenment thought, ideals of the French and American Revolutions and of the romantic movement.9Romantic love as an expression of an individual’s desire for fulfillment has its dark side, as it can unleash selfish concerns. Thus, Robert A. Johnson, a Christian theologian, defines romantic love as “airy, fantasy, projections, and an evanescent high. It is fundamentally egotistical—fixated on its own wants and whims. It can never lay the foundation for personal commitments.” 10 The Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thích Nhất Hạnh (b. 1926) states that love can become a kind of sickness when it forms an attachment, similar to drug dependency. When we are under its spell, we are preoccupied with the object of our love and we desire to control and possess the other. To Ven. Hạnh, this is not true love since “it is only the willingness to make use of the other person in order to satisfy our own needs.” 11 Both Johnson and Ven. Hạnh while criticizing romanticized concepts of love are not giving up on possibility of intimate love. Johnson calls this intimate connection with another person a “human love,” a love that affirms and appreciates another person as she or he actually is, in their totality. Instead of prizing... (shrink)

This essay analyzes the coherency and reasonableness of legal restrictions against same-sex marriage. The population of focus is transgender individuals and their partners. Focusing on trans-marriage makes clear that the restriction of marriage to one man and one woman is misguided in that the law rests on the assumption that the categories of sex and gender comprise two disjoint, exhaustive, and unambiguous groupings. The primary argument here is not that the restrictions of same-sex marriage are (...) harmful to certain transpersons who participate in legal marriage, although they certainly are, but rather that this legal restriction fails to meet the minimum requirements of any reasonable law. This analysis compares the current marriage restriction and its reliance on the above mentioned false belief with judgments of the Race Classification Appeal Board of Apartheid era South Africa. I employ two actual cases and the legal philosophy of Lon L. Fuller in my argument. (shrink)

The Samaritan woman in John 4 has been generally viewed as morally loose because of her marital experience. Nigerian women with similar experience are also perceived by many as morally deficient. This article examined the woman’s experience in light of divorce and remarriage in Nigeria. Employing the reader-oriented and descriptive methods, the essay found that in his encounter with the Samaritan woman Jesus did not accuse her of any sin. Moreover, the Pentateuchal laws, which were binding also (...) on Samaritans, had provisions by which it was permissible for a woman to be married several times. Therefore, the woman’s marital experience did not necessarily make her morally deficient. The article also found that in Nigeria certain patriarchal factors do force women out of marriage, which also has nothing to do with their moral status. Due to the Christian doctrine that prohibits a woman to marry another man while her husband is still alive, some churches treat women divorcees with contempt and segregation. But this doctrine is based on biblical passages, which if adapted to the Nigerian readers’ context make divorce and remarriage acceptable. This view is in line with Jesus’ open attitude to the Samaritan woman. Therefore, in the Nigerian context the pastoral significance of the Samaritan woman’s story resides not in her morality but in the church recognising that divorce and remarriage do not constitute disobedience to scripture, and that they are not necessarily an indication of moral misconduct on the part of the affected women.Contribution: Contributing to the scholarly discussion on the Samaritan woman narrative, the article compared her marital experience with those of Nigerian women affected by divorce and remarriage, and postulated that their experiences are not necessarily an indication of moral depravity on their part. (shrink)

The main goal of this paper is to present the philosophical explanation of the marital relationship according to the Polish philosopher Karol Wojtyła. In our research, our attention was focused mainly on his book Love and Responsibility; the early philosophical work of a young, 37 year old Professor of Philosophy at the Catholic University in Lublin, Poland. In his writings, Karol Wojtyła—the future Pope John Paul II—presents marriage as a monogamous, indissoluble relationship between a man and a woman, (...) which grows out of mutual love for the purpose of procreation. Such a relationship is ruled by the „personalistic norm" which says that a person can never, under any circumstances, be a mere object of enjoyment for another person, but can only be the object of love. Love is a self-giving for the good of one's counterpart, so Marriage as a personalistic unity persists as long as these persons are alive. Because love is fecund from its very essence, so it is fruitful from its nature. Thus, procreation belongs to the principle ends of marriage. Such an attitude—as K. Wojtyła proves—is opposed to the utilitarian point of view of man and Marriage. According to the utilitarian conception, a person can be used as a means for achieving the highest good, i.e., pleasure. (shrink)

Detailing the logic of Clausewitz’s depiction of war as the violent pursuit of the politics of submission, I read the recent protests in Iran as a feminist revolt against Iran’s fundamentalist Islamic war on women. This war is institutionalized in the war-like violence of veiling, gender apartheid, and marriage and family law. Rebelling under the slogan “Woman, Life, Freedom” the people of Iran tie the destiny of women to the destiny of all. The government has crushed the uprising. (...) It has not quelled the protestors’ demands. Signs of resistance continue as the rebellion inhales the hope of a time to come of freedom. (shrink)

This article examines Brazilian writer Clarice Lispector’s contributions to the women’s pages of the newspapers Correio da Manhã and Diário da Noite between 1959 and 1961. While Lispector’s fictional output has spawned a steady flow of scholarly and academic studies from a wide array of disciplines and fields of study, her journalistic production, in particular the women’s pages she crafted under a pseudonym, has hardly received any critical attention. The “women’s page” is a fixed section in magazines and newspapers entirely (...) dedicated to women, addressed specifically to a female readership, and generally authored by a woman or a female persona. The purpose of this article is to redress this critical oversight and complement the only study so far of this corpus – Aparecida Maria Nunes’s Clarice Lispector Jornalista – by arguing that, in Lispector’s hands, these pages become spaces of potential cultural and political intervention. Through their nuanced parody of other comparable discursive spaces and their overemphasis on what is culturally constructed as feminine, Lispector’s pages perform a transvestite gesture that unsettles normative models of femininity and dislodges a heteronormative temporality predicated upon birth, marriage, reproduction, and death. (shrink)

It has long been recognized that the Indian subcontinent is home to two markedly different systems of kinship that broadly correspond to prominent linguistic and geographical divisions in the region: those of the Indo-Āryan North and the Dravidian South. Moreover, scholars have widely agreed that the most distinctive feature of Dravidian kinship is the widespread practice of cross-cousin marriage in its various forms. In the Indo-Āryan North, by contrast, a man is generally forbidden from marrying a woman to (...) whom he is biologically related in any way within a fairly large number of generations. Nevertheless, by the close of the first millennium CE, Brāhmaṇa intellectuals throughout India shared in common both a canon of scriptural sources and a complex tradition of jurisprudence known as Dharmaśāstra. Hence, this raises the question: How did classical Brāhmaṇical jurists of the North and the South deal with the controversial issue of cross-cousin marriage? It is this question that this article aims to address in comprehensive detail. In particular, it will trace the treatment of cross-cousin marriage within Dharmaśāstra from the earliest texts of the tradition up to the two earliest and most prominent juridical defenses of the custom, composed in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. It will then conclude by drawing attention to a rare case where a particular Dharmaśāstra work can be seen to have influenced the marriage practices in a particular region of South India in the premodern past. (shrink)

Este trabalho tem o objetivo de analisar a representação da mulher e da família no discurso de Dom Antônio Mazzarotto, primeiro bispo de Ponta Grossa-PR (1930-1965). Dom Antônio Mazzarotto representou o esforço normatizador da instituição católica na diocese que tomou posse em três de Maio de 1930. Nesta desenvolveu em trinta e cinco anos um intenso trabalho pastoral. Uma das estratégias de seu bispado foi à publicação de cartas pastorais para se comunicar com o clero e os fiéis. Durante sua (...) atuação na Diocese de Ponta Grossa o bispo escreveu trinta e seis cartas pastorais, uma a cada ano. Nestas cartas Dom Antônio se posicionou de forma conservadora acerca do casamento e do papel da mulher na família, algo que não fugia à norma da Igreja Católica de então. A normatização feminina perpassa pelos escritos de Dom Antônio, mais especificamente na Carta Pastoral “O Matrimônio Christão- 1934”, documento que aponta a Virgem Maria como modelo ideal de mulher esposa e mãe. Palavras Chave: Casamento, Catolicismo, Mulher.This study aims to analyze the representation of women and family in the speech of Dom Antônio Mazzarotto, first bishop of Ponta Grossa, Paraná (1930-1965). Dom Antônio Mazzarotto represented the effort of normalizing Catholic institution in the diocese in which took office on May 3, 1930. At that institution he developed an intense pastoral work in thirty-five years. One of the strategies of his bishopric was the publication of pastoral letters to communicate with the clergy and the faithful. During his tenure at Ponta Grossa Diocese the bishop wrote thirty-six pastoral letters, one every year. In these letters Dom Antônio stood conservatively about marriage and the role of women in the family, something that did not escape the rule of the Catholic Church then. The normative feminine permeates the writings of Dom Antônio, more specifically in Pastoral Letter “O Matrimônio Christão-1934”, document that shows the Virgin Mary as a model of ideal woman wife and mother. Keywords: Marriage, Catholicism, Woman. (shrink)

In What is Marriage? One Man and One Woman: A Defense, Sherif Girgis, Ryan Anderson and Robert George defend the ‘conjugal marriage’ while claiming to make no moral judgments about homosexuality. My contention in this article is that the argument of What is Marriage is not sufficiently different from the arguments of classical new natural law theorists, and, therefore, What is Marriage does not remain neutral on the question of whether homosexuality is moral. First, I (...) give an overview of some classical NNLT arguments on the nature of marriage and their sexual ethic. Next, I present What is Marriage's account of conjugal marriage as a comprehensive union of two people, focusing on what makes a genuinely bodily union. I then move to the central contention of this article. By drawing on its understanding of genuinely bodily union and its account of the harm of same-sex marriage, I argue that What is Marriage is committed to the view that same-sex sexual unions cannot be good, since on its account of things there can be no shared sexual goods in a same-sex sexual ‘union’. (shrink)

Most governments worldwide recognize marriage as the union only of man and woman. Especially in Europe and North America, however, there is growing support for legalization of same-sex marriages. The impending shift in marriage policy posits the supposed insignificance of sexual difference. There is thus a need for comprehensive reflection on the essential substance of sexual differences, and on the legal and social relevance of sexual complementarity. Defendersof traditional marriage must be prepared to offer reasons why (...) society must continue to recognize sexual difference as a fundamental attribute of marriage,argued in terms that carry authority and meaning in today’s post-Christian ethos. National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 9.3 (Autumn 2009): 441–446. (shrink)

This essay argues that marriage is to be defined as an exclusive, indissoluble union of one man and one woman with openness to children. The nature of marriage is approached through an exploration of the nature of love, understood as willing the good of the other. From this study, marriage’s essential characteristics of exclusivity, indissolubility, heterosexuality, and fruitfulness emerge. A brief consideration of the role of the state and its interest in marriage shows that the (...) legal definition of marriage should not deviate from this reality. National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 11.2 (Summer 2012): 267–275. (shrink)

In sixteenth-century South India, the notion of the imagination was strongly thematized as perhaps the defining aspect of the human mind. We examine one striking example, an allegorical play called the Bhāvanā-puruṣottama by Ratnakheta Srinivasa Dīkṣita. Here we see a king searching frantically for his own imagination, the young woman Bhāvanā with whom he is in love, while she, for her part, is absorbed in the uneven and rather frustrating processes of imagining him. The two lovers could be said (...) mutually to determine one another’s existence. On the other hand, imagination, for this poet, is not a matter of discovering something new but of perceiving something that is already there and, by perceiving it, enhancing or intensifying its presence and its activity. At the same time, the imagination focuses on singularities, however elusive: in this period, the general faculty of imagination has become a highly personal matter. (shrink)

While standard histories of Western political thought represent women’s rights as an offshoot of the earlier movement for the equal rights of men, this essay argues that the eighteenth-century push for democracy and equal rights was grounded in arguments first used to defend women’s right to moral and religious self-determination, based on their rational and spiritual equality with men. In tandem with the rise of critiques of absolute monarchy, ideal marriage, which had previously involved lordship and subjection, was transformed (...) into an equal companionate relationship based on inclination and affection. The essay argues that the transformation, by the time of the American and French revolutions, of neo-Roman republicanism—which had been aristocratic and oligarchic—into egalitarian, democratic republicanism had been mediated by the extension of arguments, widely distributed in the literature criticizing the slavery of marriage, into a general critique of slavery and support for the equal rights of men. (shrink)

Volume 4 Lysistrata, or Woman’s Future and Future Woman A M Ludovici Originally published in 1927 " Pro-feminine but anti-feminist…" Scotsman " A stimulating book" Sunday Times This volume represents an attack on many modern conventions and practices which, according to the author, the world has tolerated too long in connection with marriage and the relationship between the sexes. 112pp Chronos Or The Future of the Family Eden Paul Originally published in 1930 "Deserves to be read by (...) a large number of people. It is a proof of the revolution in the family and sexual relations which is taking place before our eyes." Nation This volume discusses the effect of sexual reform on family life and education and concludes that the family is in process of decay. The causes of this decay, among which birth control and the sexual and economic emancipation of women are two of the most notable – are traced. 58pp Aphrodite Or The Future of Sexual Relationships Ralph de Pomerai Originally published in 1931 Recognizing that the existing code of sexual morality is in process of rapid disintegration, this volume analyzes modern conditions and outlines the tendency of future development. It traces the origin and development of sex; indicates its biological function, other than reproductive and expounds its psychical and physical value for the individual and its proper place in life. Finally the essential requirements of a new sexual morality are applied to pre-marital, marital, and extra-marital relationships. (shrink)

A proposta deste artigo é a de buscar entender as formas de como a Igreja Católica procurou adentrar nas bases psicológicas dos cristãos por meio da Constituição Pastoral Gaudium et Spes em seu Capítulo I intitulado “A promoção da dignidade do matrimônio e da família”. A Instituição insistiu no argumento segundo o qual a união entre homem e mulher constitui um sacramento essencial à família, à sociedade, à moralidade, à boa conduta, à ética e, por fim, à salvação da alma. (...) Pode-se vislumbrar, na construção de tal argumento, um amplo uso de “jogos psicológicos”, sustentados na concepção que buscava transformar o matrimônio em uma macro-política cotidiana da moral, a qual tinha por fim convencer e, por conseguinte, ligar homens e mulheres por meio da idéia da indissolubilidade do matrimônio. O aparato teórico da aqui chamada macro-política cotidiana da moral permite compreender como a Igreja Católica jamais esteve alheia às mudanças que se operavam em meados do século XX. Palavras-Chave: Matrimônio. Família. Igreja Católica. Usos Psicológicos.This article aims to understand the ways used by the Catholic Church in order to enter in the psychological foundations of Christians through the Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et Spes in Chapter I entitled “The promotion of the dignity of marriage and the family”. The institution insisted on the argument that the union between man and woman is an essential sacrament to the family, society, morality, good conduct, ethics and, finally, to the salvation of the soul. One can envision, in the construction of such an argument, an extensive use of “mind games”, supported the concept that sought to transform marriage in a macro-politics of everyday morality, which was intended to convince and therefore call men and women through the idea of the indissolubility of marriage. The theoretical apparatus here called the macro-politics of everyday morality allows us to understand how the Catholic Church has never been alien to the changes which were taking place in the mid-twentieth century. Keywords : Marriage. Family. Catholic Church. Psychological Uses. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In recent years, debates on same-sex marriage and the recognition of transwomen as women have been raging. These debates often seem to revolve around the meaning of, respectively, the word ‘marriage’ and ‘woman’. That such debates should take place might be puzzling. It seems that if debates on gay and transgender rights revolve around the meaning of these words, then those in favor of same-sex marriage and of the recognition of transwomen as women have no (...) room left to maneuver. However, prima facie, the pro – and anti-, in both cases, have genuine disagreements over the meaning of these words: though the analyses of revisionary theorists are revisionary, they are analyses. Sally Haslanger and other philosophers in her wake have appealed to an anti-descriptivist externalist view of meaning to provide the conceptual foundations of this practice of revisionary theorizing: revisionary analyses bring to light what, unbeknownst to us, these words mean. In this paper, I argue that a descriptivist externalist view should be preferred instead. My argument rests on the thesis that what is contested in these debates is the meaning of the words ‘marriage’ and ‘women’ as used in the law. (shrink)

There is room for everyone in the Catholic Church, but there is no consent for same-sex marriage in that Church as marriage only between a baptized man and a woman is a sacrament. Same-sex marriage is inconsistent with the Holy Scripture where marriage is based on God’s natural law. This official Scripture’s interpretation results in lack of possibility to reconciliate the official teaching of the Church with the recognition of same-sex marriage. The world is (...) moving forward and so are the opinions of Christians and their growing support for same-sex marriage. Such marriage is recognized in thirty states worldwide, including states with dominant Catholic religion. Regardless the official teaching, the Catholic Church’s position is not uniform. The paper discusses the official interpretation of the Scripture concerning homosexuals, analyses the position of the Catholic Church toward same-sex marriage and indicates differences in Christians’ attitudes with respect to same-sex couples in Western and Eastern Europe. (shrink)

A familiar theme in Greek myth is that of the deadly gift that passes between a man and a woman. Analysis of exchanges between men and women reveals the gendered nature of exchange in ancient Greek mythic thinking. Using the anthropological categories of male and female wealth , it is possible to arrive at an understanding of the protocols of exchange as they relate to men and especially to women. These protocols, which are based in part on the distinction (...) between metals and other durable goods as "male" and textiles as "female," are closely related to the gendered division of labor. Anxiety about women as exchangers derives in part from their status as objects exchanged in marriage , and partly from a misogynist and pessimistic strand of Greek thought that discounts any female economic contribution to the oikos. Indeed, the majority of destructive exchanges take place within the context of marital crisis. While some texts, beginning with the Odyssey, show the positive side of women's economic role, tragedy tends to follow the Hesiodic distrust of women as exchange partners. Passages from the Agamemnon and the Trachiniai are analyzed to show how in situations of perverted reciprocity brought about by marital discord, even women's traditional gifts of textiles may become deadly. (shrink)

Philosophers of earlier ages have usually spent time in considering thenature of marital, and in general familial, duty. Paley devotes an entire book to those ‘relative duties which result from the constitution of the sexes’,1 a book notable on the one hand for its humanity and on the other for Paley‘s strange refusal to acknowledge that the evils for which he condemns any breach of pure monogamy are in large part the result of the fact that such breaches are generally (...) condemned. In a society where an unmarried mother is ruined no decent male should put a woman in such danger: but why precisely should social feeling be so severe? Marriage, the monogamist would say, must be defended at all costs, for it is a centrally important institution of our society. Political community was, in the past, understood as emerging from or imposed upon families, or similar associations. The struggle to establish the state was a struggle against families, clans and clubs; the state, once established, rested upon the social institutions to which it gave legal backing. (shrink)

In medieval England, as in the rest of Christian Europe, marriages contracted privately and solely by the exchange of words of present consent — something like “I here take you as my legitimate wife [husband]” — were considered binding even without consummation from the late twelfth century. Such marriages would be enforced by the ecclesiastical courts, even if the enforcement required a divorce between a man and woman solemnly married in church. Such a divorce, of course, was never a (...) divorce in the modern sense, but rather an annulment, a judicial declaration that since one of the parties to that church ceremony had already been married, the ecclesiastical ceremony had not produced a marriage at all. The original, privately contracted marriage stood in full force. The moral problems faced by the ecclesiastical courts in such matters were substantial; the problems presented for the king's court, particularly in matters relating to property rights, were no less so. (shrink)

In Chinese philosophy’s encounter with modernity and feminist discourse, Neo-Confucianism often suffered the most brutal attacks and criticisms. In “Neo-Confucians and Zhu Xi on Family and Woman: Challenges and Potentials,” Ann A. Pang-White investigates Song Neo-Confucians’ views (in particular, that of Zhu Xi) on women by examining the Classifi ed Conversations of Zhu Xi (Zhuzi Yulei), the Reflections on Things at Hand (Jinsi Lu), Further Reflections on Things at Hand (Xu Jinsi Lu), and other texts. Pang-White also takes a (...) close look at the Song law regarding women’s property rights and the Song educational system. Surprisingly,Zhu exhibited a level of flexibility, though still limited, on these subjects. He was particularly adamant about the importance of women’s education. In addition, even though he opposed the social practice and women’s ownership of dowry (seeing it as a form of commercializing marriage), he did not absolutely oppose women’s property rights. However, his normative and philosophical view on the male/yang and female/yin relationship was less satisfactory. At one place, he used it to illustrate gender equity; at another place, he defended female subordination. Zhu’s social-political teaching on women’s role could benefit from a more consistent development of his metaphysics of li-qi and yin-yang, which can bring new insight to the contemporary feminist “essentialist versus non-essentialist” debate on sex and gender. (shrink)

From a rebellious young woman with a dangerous heroin habit to a globe-trotting fashion model to “First Lady of Yoga” (The New York Times), Colleen Saidman Yee tells the remarkable story of how she found herself through the healing power of yoga—and then inspired others to do the same. I’ve learned how to extract the beauty of an ordinary day. I’ve learned that the best high exists in the joy—or the sadness—of the present moment. Yoga allows me to surf (...) the ripples and sit with the mud, while catching glimpses of the clarity of my home at the bottom of the lake: my true self. The very first time Saidman Yee took a yoga class, she left feeling inexplicably different—something inside had shifted. She felt alive—so alive that yoga became the center of her life, helping her come to terms with her insecurities and find her true identity and voice. From learning to cope with a frightening seizure disorder to navigating marriages and divorces to becoming a mother, finding the right life partner, and grieving a beloved parent, Saidman Yee has been through it all—and has found that yoga holds the answers to life’s greatest challenges. Approachable, sympathetic, funny, and candid, Saidman Yee shares personal anecdotes along with her compassionate insights and practical instructions for applying yoga to everyday issues and anxieties. Specific yoga sequences accompany each chapter and address everything from hormonal mood swings to detoxing, depression, stress, and increased confidence and energy. Step-by-step instructions and photographs demonstrate her signature flow of poses so you can follow them effortlessly. Yoga for Life offers techniques to bring awareness to every part of your physical and spiritual being, allowing you to feel truly alive and to embody the peace of the present moment. (shrink)

In the case of Bellinger v. Bellingerthe House of Lords has for the first time exercised the power to make a declaration of incompatibility under s. 4 of the Human Rights Act 1998, finding that U.K. law on marriage is in breach of Articles 8 and 12 of the European Convention on Human Rights. This case note argues, however, that despite this decision, and despite also recent judgements of the European Court of Human Rights upholdingthe rights of transsexual people, (...) the principles applied in Bellingerdemonstrate that judicial discourse on transsexuality remains bound within the heterosexual and biological framework of Corbett v. Corbett. (shrink)

Religion has an essential effect on the development of any society since it impacts religious norms and models of behaviour, establishes priorities and values, influences gender relations, predetermines gender roles, and influences the establishing of certain traditions, laws, and customs. This article is a review of the historic position of the Russian Orthodox Church – the dominant religion in Russia – its past and current status in Russia, and the issues relating to women in Russian socio-cultural and religious community. While (...) there is a lack of research on the Russian Orthodox Church and its influence on Russians and, particularly, Russian women, the increased religiosity in Russia within the last decade requires us to study the Russian Orthodoxy and its impact on people’s lives and its attitude to gender. This article provides a deep analysis of the impact of the Russian Orthodox Church on the image of women in Russia. It has been argued that Russian national character and heritage was formed by the Russian Orthodox Church and the existing gender stereotypes in Russia have been significantly impacted by the Russian Orthodox Church and have mainly been derived from the interpretation of the New Testament by the Russian Orthodoxy and its clergy. Particularly, gender roles and the perception of family, and marriage are understood to be in compliance with the values of the Russian Orthodox faith. For the faith the most important purpose of marriage is the birth and raising of children and the chief responsibility and duty of a woman is to care for her husband and children as these are considered as a way of the woman’s service to society and to God. (shrink)

In Chinese philosophy’s encounter with modernity and feminist discourse, Neo-Confucianism often suffered the most brutal attacks and criticisms. In “Neo-Confucians and Zhu Xi on Family and Woman: Challenges and Potentials,” Ann A. Pang-White investigates Song Neo-Confucians’ views (in particular, that of Zhu Xi) on women by examining the Classified Conversations of Zhu Xi (Zhuzi Yulei),the Reflections on Things at Hand (Jinsi Lu), Further Reflections on Things at Hand (Xu Jinsi Lu), and other texts. Pang-White also takes a close look (...) at the Song law regarding women’s property rights and the Song educational system. Surprisingly, Zhu exhibited a level of flexibility, though still limited, on these subjects. He was particularly adamant about the importance of women’s education. In addition,even though he opposed the social practice and women’s ownership of dowry (seeing it as a form of commercializing marriage), he did not absolutely oppose women’s property rights. However, his normative and philosophical view on the male/yang and female/yin relationship was less satisfactory. At one place, he used it to illustrate gender equity; at another place, he defended female subordination. Zhu’s social-political teaching on women’s role could benefit from a more consistent development of his metaphysics of li-qi and yin-yang , which can bring new insight to the contemporary feminist “essentialist versus non-essentialist” debate on sex and gender. (shrink)

There has been broad interest in the so-called rise of women farmers in United States (US) agriculture. Researchers have elucidated the diverse ways farmers ‘perform’ gender, while also examining how engaging in a masculine-coded industry like agriculture shapes individuals’ gendered identities as well as their social and mental wellbeing. While illuminating, this work is mostly focused on sustainable or direct-market farmers, with surprisingly little research examining women on conventional row crops operations. This paper works to fill this empirical gap and (...) further theorize gender-agriculture intersections through analyzing interviews with Iowa women row-crop farmers to understand the ways they perceive their gendered identities, and how they see them shaping their farming experience and mental wellbeing. Deploying a conceptual understanding of gender as both discursive and embodied as well as relational and fluid, I find respondents see themselves operating in a somewhat liminal gender identity, where they feel adept at moving between masculinized spaces of agriculture and more feminized domains of homes and office jobs. Critically, while women rarely expressed stress about doing “masculine” coded agricultural labor, they had more complex feelings towards either disliking or imperfectly completing feminized care and reproductive labor. Younger women expressed particular ambivalence about assuming the identity of farmer while also fulfilling gendered norms around (heterosexual) marriage and childbearing. The liminality of women’s gender performance also cut both ways, and while they feel able to access different gendered spaces some feel they are not fully accepted in either. I conclude by reflecting on what these particular forms of gendered subjectivity might mean for women’s mental wellbeing and how agencies might better support gender equity in agriculture. (shrink)

In the case of Bellinger v. Bellingerthe House of Lords has for the first time exercised the power to make a declaration of incompatibility under s. 4 of the Human Rights Act 1998, finding that U.K. law on marriage is in breach of Articles 8 and 12 of the European Convention on Human Rights. This case note argues, however, that despite this decision, and despite also recent judgements of the European Court of Human Rights upholdingthe rights of transsexual people, (...) the principles applied in Bellingerdemonstrate that judicial discourse on transsexuality remains bound within the heterosexual and biological framework of Corbett v. Corbett. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Feminist Studies 45, no. 1. © 2019 by Feminist Studies, Inc. 13 Stephanie Yingyi Wang When Tongzhi Marry: Experiments of Cooperative Marriage between Lalas and Gay Men in Urban China Ang Lee’s film The Wedding Banquet could be classic introductory material for tongzhi studies and, particularly, for research on cooperative marriage.1 In the film, Wai-Tung, a Taiwanese landlord who lives happily with his American boyfriend Simon in (...) New York, is troubled by his parents’ constant efforts to try and find him a bride. His partner Simon suggests he could arrange a marriage of convenience with WaiTung ’s tenant Wei Wei who is from mainland China and is also in need of a green card to stay in the United States. However, their plan backfires when Wai-Tung’s enthusiastic parents arrive in the United States and plan a big wedding banquet. As the film critic and scholar Chris 1. Tongzhi, literally “same purpose,” is the Chinese term for “comrade.” Since the 1990s, it has been appropriated to replace the more formal tóngxìnglìan (same-sex love) to refer to gay men and lalas (same-sex desiring women) in the Chinese-speaking world. The translation of xinghun as “cooperative marriage” is debatable, as xinghun literally means “pro-forma marriage.” In other works, “contract marriage,” “fake marriage,” or “pro-forma marriage” are used to refer to gay-lala marriage. Informed by Lucetta Kam’s work, I use “cooperative marriage ” to highlight that such marriage is not merely functional without sustenance, but is contingent on the cooperation and negotiation between multiple parties in the relationship, as my findings suggest. See Lucetta Yip Lo Kam, Shanghai Lalas: Female Tongzhi Communities and Politics in Urban China (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2013), 85. winner of the 2018 Feminist Studies Graduate Student award 14 Stephanie Yingyi Wang Berry points out, analysis of the film rests not on any individual, but on the Confucian family as “it negotiates the interface with globally hegemonic American culture,” suggesting that there exists an understanding of gayness in the context of the family that is distinct in Chinese culture.2 Berry continues to argue that the moral ambivalence produced by the film is structured by different sets of values: the gay person is not merely concerned about individual identity fulfillment, but he also adjusts his actions to satisfy the family expectation; the parents, especially the father figure, is not merely a patriarch with strict moral provisions and standards, but someone who can allow for implicit negotiation to keep the surface harmony as long as he gets a grandson; the woman is not merely an independent agent freed from social constraints, but a bride who is also attached to emotional comfort and conjugal ideals. Just as The Wedding Banquet tactfully reveals one type of cooperative marriage with its mutual benefits and examines the multilayered complexity of each individual player in the marriage game, this research takes as its subject cooperative marriage between gay men and lalas as an exciting departure to understand queer subjectivities and queer kinship intersected with gender, sexuality, class, and tongzhi politics in urban China.3 Though seemingly monolithic, marriage and family have become contested terrains for tongzhi to negotiate their gender performance, queer desires, and aspirations for better lives. The transnational makings of gayness and rights-based identity politics have contributed to the increasing awareness of a cosmopolitan gay identity and the desiring of alternative life choices of Chinese tongzhi, which lays the very foundation of their motivation to seek ways to cope with the heteronormative family model. Coming out and gay marriage are upheld as primary tropes of identity politics, facilitated by the self-identified tongzhi grassroots groups that emerged during the initiation of AIDS work in 1994 for gay men and at the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women, which gathered hundreds of lesbians from around the world in Beijing.4 How2. Chris Berry, “Wedding Banquet: A Family (Melodrama) Affair,” in his Chinese Films in Focus: 25 New Takes (London: British Film Institute, 2003), 183. 3. Lala is a slang term in China for same-sex desiring women and includes lesbian, bisexual, and trans women. 4. Katie King, “‘There Are No... (shrink)

Alice Dunbar-Nelson is mostly remembered as a poet, activist, and ex-wife of Paul Laurence Dunbar. Her volume The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories (1899) has been largely overshadowed as a result. Yet, the collection contains a portfolio of heroines analogous and contemporaneous to the famed New Woman figure of the fin de siècle. In this article, I consider Dunbar-Nelson’s heroines in light of their New Woman-esque agency and autonomy as they find remedies and power in objects (...) and materials steeped in New Orleans’s cultural heritage. Ceded neither social nor political self-governance nor domestic comfort, this article reads these transcendental, metaphysical objects as sources of self-care. With close analysis of “The Goodness of St. Rocque,” “Tony’s Wife,” and “Little Miss Sophie,” I argue that Dunbar-Nelson’s protagonists exert influence over their lives, specifically in the negotiation of romantic relationships, through voodoo charms, Catholic candles, tarot cards, sewing machines, and knitting needles. Covering courtship, break-ups, and unhappy marriages, I demonstrate the ways in which these empowering spiritual objects respond to health concerns, including malnutrition and domestic violence, in turn, situating them as alternatives to patriarchal and historically racist medical institutions. Valorizing the cultural milieu of New Orleans and the customs of the Caribbean and European heritage, and thereby conveying Dunbar-Nelson’s resistance to white and male supremacist ideologies in late-nineteenth-century Southern America, the article ultimately assesses the parallels with (predominantly white) New Woman fiction, through shared themes of fraught heterosexual dynamics and women’s declining health. (shrink)

Based on historical data pertaining to the Krummhörn population (eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Germany), we compared reproductive histories of mothers according to whether the maternal grandmother (MGM) or the paternal grandmother (PGM) or neither of them was resident in the parents’ parish at the time of the mother’s first birth. In contrast to effects of PGMs, we discovered conditional differences in the MGM’s effects between landless people and wealthier, commercial farmers. Our data indicate that the presence of the MGM only (...) lowers the woman’s age at marriage (AAM) and her age at the birth of her first child (AFB) in the case of landless families. However, among commercial farmers, who can generally be characterized by a lower AAM and AFB, we found opposite tendencies for the MGM’s effect leading to a relatively small delay in AAM and AFB. Moreover, we also analyzed differences in the completed fertility (i.e., children ever born: CEB). Results indicate that landless families in general do have fewer CEB compared with commercial farmers except for those families in which the MGM has been present. Emphasizing that the adaptiveness of investment decisions should depend on the interaction of genetic, lineage-specific (intrinsic) and ecologically imposed (extrinsic) constraints, we conclude that kin strategies consequently address different fitness components under different conditions. (shrink)

In this paper, I critically challenge the ability of legal reforms to recognize and integrate the way in which a rape victim sees rape. Current limitations to the law are mainly due to the accepted patriarchal view on law as a form of objective and rational knowledge, outside which there are only impracticable and irrational views. I investigate the case of marriage jurisprudence in the UK, as a prominent example, because it has long accepted marital rape as objectively and (...) rationally part of a wife’s duty. Even though changes have occurred which improve the marital rape jurisdiction and prejudicial disbelief concerning a woman’s private life is still used in the courts to question the credibility of the victim. Over the past year, extensive efforts have been made to reform the management of rape cases. Whilst there is a need to acknowledge the seriousness of the accusation with rigorous legal principles which provide appropriate safeguards for the accused person as well as the complainant, especially bearing in mind the often “private” circumstances, with a concomitant lack of witnesses, it remains the case that the rate of attribution in attempts to secure successful prosecutions in rape case remains overwhelming. I show how a Wittgensteinian approach to law would take into consideration the shape of gendered lives as they are experienced, and hence would not accept just one legal interpretation of marital law. The phenomenon of “seeing-as” in Wittgenstein’s philosophy can support the experience of being jolted into appreciating the feminist aspect of consent in marital sexual relationships. (shrink)