Marriage is one of the basic institutions which may be regarded as the central feature of all forms of human societies right from tribal to highly industrialized ones. What do we mean by the term marriage? Everyone knows in general what a marriage means in one's society, but when we want to examine marriage customs of other societies, we need a definition which would cover all the different forms of the institution of marriage. The same is true about the family and many other institutions.
Marriage is a special type of person-to-person relationship, involving mutual rights and duties. But all types of person-to-person relationships involving mutual rights and obligations are not called marital relations. The marital relationship obtains between two individuals of opposite sex who have, in effect, made a contract between them that they shall hence-forth, or until the contract is abrogated, fulfil towards each other certain obligations. The peculiar obligations which they assume may vary from one society to another. However, the most common requirement is that of cohabitation in most of the societies, and marriage is often regarded primarily as a means of regularizing sex relations. Child-bearing, child-rearing, economic support, and exchange of affection are some of the other widely accepted marital duties. But this type of definition does not exhaust different types pf marriages throughout the world. Marriage can be a sacrament and not always a contract and relationship involving mutual rights and obligations. So, we have to look for a wider definition in order to understand different marriage customs of the world.
Marriage may be defined as a culturally approved retationship of one man and one woman (monogamy), or of one man and two or more women (polygyny), or of one woman and two or more men (Polyandry), in which there is cultural endorsement of sexual intercourse between the marital partners of opposite sex and, generally, the expectation that children will be born of the relationship.1 But definition marriage is a relationship within which sexual intercourse is legitimate. Legitimacy of marriage gives a woman a socially recognized husband or vice versa and their children a socially recognized father and mother. Marriage creates or maintains affinal relationships between the kinsman of individuals who claim the roles of husband and wife. Thus, legitimacy is a necessary condition for marriage and formation of family from a socio-logical point of view. It is a social arrangement of assuming the kinship status of husband and wife by the man and woman entering marital relationship. The children born out of such socially recognized union are given legitimate position in the society, determined by parenthood in the social sense. Though there are variations in the definition of the marriage with the result that it is not possible to give a universal defintion of marriage, still it would appear that the cross-cultural study of marriage must rest on the premise that all societies recognize kinship roles of husband and wife which are founded in law as well as those which are based on actual, assumed, or presumed genetic relationships. According to Gloria A. Marshall, while it is normally expected that marriage would lead to parent-hood, the roles of husband and wife need not be defined by reference to children who will come to be regarded as legitimate offspring of individuals in these roles. He has rightly stressed that the roles of husband and wife should be defined in terms of rights and obligations which attach to them, and marriage must be defined as the lawfully or jurally recognised assumption of these roles.
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