The Case of Love: Culture, Social Structures, and Sentiment
We look at how social factors shape two aspects of romantic love in the US: Love and Marriage \& Sex without Love
Who do you love?
Isn't it very individual and personal?
- All societies have distinct social patterns associated with love.
- Our practices and beliefs about love are socially constructed.
The Social Construction of Love:
Eva Illouz's Consuming the Romantic Utopia
Helps illustrate the social construction of courtship/dating.
The changing space of courtship.
Moved from the private sphere to the public sphere
Dating involves negotiating public spaces; knowing how to conduct oneself: Manners, culturally constrained behaviors
e.g.: Country club, proper attire, adhering to the social norms of a particular group or subculture.
The economization of social relationships: now \textbf{consumption} played a huge role in dating: How much money do we spend? Where do we spend it?
Viviana Zelizer's The Purchase of Intimacy
Love is also a system that has its equivalence in goods, services, and entitlements.
Example: How do you know when you are on a date?
- What was the meaning of the consumption we now saw in dating? - What constitutes a gift and what constitutes payment? How do you know?
We have cultural templates that allow us to understand:
the intimacy level between two people
the behavioral boundaries of a relationship
the economic boundaries of a relationship between two people
These boundaries are regulated by institutions, emotions, time, and the law.
Social Factors and Mate Selection: Choice of mate is linked to social structure
Patterns of mate selection:
Endogamy: Endogamy refers to marriage within a social group
Exogamy: Exogamy refers to marriage outside a social group
Social Stratification: A group's system of ranking. Note: Society's ranking of different statuses (large groups of people) according to a hierarchy, often based on prestige/values.
The US patterns:
- Social class: Most people marry within their own social class.
- Education: People marry others with similar education.
- Age: Usually, 2-3 years difference. Societies also define the right age to get married.
- Religion: Most marry within the same religious group, but less endogamous than other categories.
- Race: This is one of the most endogamous categories, but the proportion varies by race.
Explanations for endogamous patterns:
- Preferences play a role:
- Individuals have preference for certain characteristics in a spouse.
- Our preferences are shaped by our social groups and statuses
Indirect regulation of mate selection
- "Formally Free" mate selection, but indirect regulation through restriction of social interaction.
- Influence of third parties (parents)
- Propinquity (proximity: e.g., residential segregation; school; workplace)
- Sanctions (e.g., religious)
- Those indirect regulations are ways to assure you "marry the right person."
- "Formally Free" mate selection, but indirect regulation through restriction of social interaction.
Regulation of mate selection ensures social control
- Without controls over mate selection - would have social chaos
- Different interpretations of social control over love.
Example: William Goode's The Theoretical Importance of Love
- Free love threatens class system
- Marriage between different class groups would disrupt social status of group
- Mate selection is most important for those with power and property. So, they place more restrictions on children and their social interactions.
- These mate selections patters serve to reinforce ad reproduce your position in social structure.
- Preferences play a role:
What is Love? Definitions and meaning of Love
Love and Marriage:
Example: Swidler: Talk of Love (The link between love and marriage and how we use culture to socially construct those concepts)
Background of book (Introduction):
- Interviewed 88 middle-class men and women from suburban areas San Jose, CA.
- Not typical, but "Proto-typical" Americans
- "Middle-class" culture tends to be the dominant culture in our country - or "mainstream" culture
- Most of the participants were in their 30's and 40's and were or had been married.
Culture nations of love: what is the cultural meaning of "romantic love" in the US? Two different views of love emerge in respondents' interviews.
- Love Myths - Mythic Love
- Historical origins: Courtly Love Tradition
- Bourgeois tradition reshapes courtly love
- A decisive choice (love at first sight)
- A unique other (one true love)
- Overcoming obstacles (marrying for love, not money)
- Love lasts forever ("happily ever after")
Real Love - Prosaic Realism
- Participants often de-bunk the notion of mythic love.
- Offer an alternative cultural view of "real love":
- Love grows slowly; is often ambivalent and confused
- One can love many people in a variety of ways
- Love should be based on compatibility and practical traits that make good partners.
- Love does not necessarily last forever.
- Love involves emotional sharing, communication, often equality, respect.
- Working at the relationship day-to-day
People talk about both these views of love when talking about what love means to them
- Love Myths - Mythic Love
Sex without Love:
US in the 19th and 20th century:
Sex = Love (form Judeo-Christian culture)
- Norm: Sex is part of committed loving relationship
- Values: Sex is sacred part of love relationship between monogamous couple
- So, sex without love is deviant
- In 1950's, Kinsey survey showed that more people engaged in casual sex than was expected.
- More recent patterns of sexual behavior\
- Still, the US norm is against sex without loving commitment.
21st century
Case Study: Lambert et. al. Pluralistic Ignorance and Hooking Up
Background:
In the post, research has assumed that sex without love is a problem (goes against norms).
Today, on college campuses, this kind of behavior ("hooking up") has become normative.
Hooking up occurs when two people who are casual acquaintances engage in some forms of sexual behavior with the expectation of no future commitment.
Background studies on "hooking up"
- Prevalence: What is the prevalence of hooking up?
- Bad experiences: What "bad experiences" do students describe? Gender differences in bad experiences?
Theory: Pluralistic Ignorance:
- Perceptions of other's attitudes: Group members believe that others in their group (especially leaders or popular people) endorse a particular norm.
- Own attitudes: yet, they believe their own personal attitudes are different from the norm.
- Actual behavior: however, they go along with the norm because:
- Desire to fit in with the group.
- Each person thinks that they are the only one who has conflict between their personal attitudes and their actual behavior
Methods:
- Survey
- Sample of 175 female and 152 male undergrads at mid-sized southeastern public university.
- Convenience sample (library; residence halls)
Results:
- 77.7% of women said they had hooked up
- 84.2% of men said they had hooked up
- The results with regard to comfort level with hooking up?
- Same-sex peers: How did men and women rate their comfort levels (self-ratings) as compared to others of same sex (peer-ratings)?
- Opposite-sex peers: How did men and women rate the comfort levels of the opposite sex? Did they over- or under-estimate comfort levels?
- Gender differences: What were the overall gender differences?
Conclusions:
- Findings support the theory of pluralistic ignorance:
- Hooking up has become a norm on college campuses
- Most students think other people are comfortable with it - more comfortable than they are themselves.
- \item Potential consequences of gender differences:
- Potential for sexual assault of women
- Why?
- Findings support the theory of pluralistic ignorance:
Critiques of the study?