Matrimonial strategies and social reproduction

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[edit] Matrimonial strategies and social reproduction

Bourdieu discussed how matrimonial strategies are used to improve and reproduce social structure. He compares matrimonial strategies to a card game. The outcome depends on the deal, the cards held, and the player’s skill. Thus, the means of production, number of men, and the symbolic and material capital possessed by the families involved are important in the negotiations of the marriage. The strategy applied is comprised of many components based on the families’ interests and their positions within the structure of power. Women make it possible to start the negotiation process, while men mediate and introduce the family’s symbolic capital. Each group then engages in a decision-making process (obtaining social and economic history, the symbolic patrimony, and each family’s position in its group). The marriage resulting from the negotiations is “mediated by the domestic power structure.” The families are concerned with the maintenance and reproduction of the family, not the production of assets. The following are interesting areas Bordiueu discusses as he explores matrimonial strategies.

• • Relationships between brothers
• Brothers are divided.
• The relationship between brothers is the foundation of the family structure and is also a source of weakness.
• There is a forced solidarity, which is reinforced when there is a threat to jointly owned possessions and symbolic patrimony.
• "I hate my brother, but I hate the man who hate him."
  • Divorce
• Measures are taken to prevent the total loss of the capital of alliances.
• Divorce may be attributed to the husband’s youth.
• The greater the importance of marriage, the more invested one is and therefore wants to preserve the relations between families.
• A man divorced is expected to remarry, but a divorced woman is devalued and a widow is excluded from the marital market.
  • Gender Differences
• Women don’t have full participation in symbolic capital.
• Women are also confined to the domestic sphere
• The marriages women are responsible for are considered ordinary marriages.
• Men’s interest are directed towards reinforcing the domestic unit’s integration of the family’s network of alliances, which helps expand symbolic capital.
• A man does not marry a higher status woman.
  • Urgency of marriage
• Marriages are often viewed as an urgent matter because the parents want to be around to see their children marry, to ensure that their son marries a suitable woman.
  • Marriages are not isolated units
• Marriages within a family are dependent on one another and are influenced by each child's position. The eldest boy is favored and he should be the first to marry and marry outside the lineage. However, the eldest son’s position is dependent o whether or not he is an only child, only son, or has several brothers. A family with many sons has more options and can invest each son differently.
  • Summing it Up
• Matrimonial strategies are employed to conserve or expand the material and symbolic capital of the families involved. Above all, these strategies are used as a means to reproduce or improve one’s position in the social structure.